


Quantity Over Quality

by Prim_the_Amazing



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Illustrated, Multi, Violence, simtroopers as AI
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2019-04-25 23:18:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 52
Words: 79,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14389185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prim_the_Amazing/pseuds/Prim_the_Amazing
Summary: Project Freelancer is experimenting with giving their Agents AIs to help run their equipment. They're vague on the details of how they procured the AIs in the first place. And why those AIs are so fucking stupid.What's certain, though, is that PFL is in for a whole lot of chaos.





	1. four against two

**Author's Note:**

> Come and shout at me if this isn't updated every Sunday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Florida’s AI drops into his mind a furious tangle of code and snarled thoughts, ready to kill from the first second.
> 
> He’s _perfect._

Florida’s AI drops into his mind a furious tangle of code and snarled thoughts, ready to kill from the first second.

He’s _perfect._

“How do you feel?” a technician asks him, clinical and cautious. The Counselor and the Director are watching him through a bulletproof one way mirror, he knows. There are many soldiers with guns just outside the operating theatre, he knows.

He could take them all if he wanted to, he knows.

“Just fine,” he says with his friendliest smile and his warmest voice as the AI somehow gives off the impression of _spiking_ in his head, a ball of raging pain. Aw, poor guy. What had him in such a huff?

 _ <I,> _ an unfamiliar voice says in his head, sounding indignant and ready for the rant of a lifetime, but then it just… trails off. _ <I don’t rightly know.> _

It’s an old man’s voice with a Southern accent. It’s charming, Florida thinks.

“Can you feel it?” the technician asks him, nervousness beginning to bleed through her clinical demeanor. He had volunteered to be the first one for an AI implantation, after all. To his understanding, the theory has been studied and researched rigorously before now, but they’re treading entirely uncharted territory here. Anything could happen. He could have a stroke and just die right here on the operating table. He could abruptly decide to go on a killing spree. He could lose his mind.

Worst of all possibilities, nothing might happen at all.

Florida gives her a reassuring smile. “I can feel him.”

Shoulder slump around the room, relieved sighs are released, and he’s fairly sure he can _feel_ the Counselor making a list of questions to ask him about everything he says and does right now for later through the glass.

 _ <Busybody,> _his AI harrumphs disapprovingly. Florida lets his smile widen, knowing no one will know what he’s smiling about.

“Can you mentally communicate with the AI?”

“Yes.”

“Does the AI seem mentally coherent?”

“Yes.”

 _ <She’s asking an awful lot of questions, ain’t she,> _ his AI comments suspiciously.

Florida spends a moment on trying to figure out how to mentally project a response before giving up. He’s among people who knows that he’s got an AI in his head, it’s fine, he can figure out the entirely silent conversation thing later.

“That is her job,” he says mildly, accidentally cutting off the technician as she opens her mouth to ask another question. She stares at him, then starts scribbling something down in her notepad.

What follows is more questions. Many, many questions. With each one, his AI seems to grow more and more surly and agitated, until the Counselor and the Director deem him safe enough to enter the room.

When the Counselor steps inside the room, his AI falls abruptly silent. Considering the running commentary he’s had running the entire time until now, it feels a little… wrong.

“It is now time for practical testing,” the Director says. The technician that Florida has been speaking with until now snaps her mouth shut, looking like she wants to protest but is too afraid-- _respectful_ to do so.

Florida is directed out of the room in the direction of the sparring gym, and he goes along with it amiably. As he walks past the Counselor, he feels something like the AI’s hackles raising, a venomous _ <That snake’s up to something, I can tell.> _ ringing out in his head. _ <Shifty looking bastard.> _

Florida feels like he should be telling his AI that the Counselor’s a perfectly nice and friendly man, but it probably wouldn’t be too tactful to speak up and let him know to his face that his AI’s insulting him.

(Besides, deep down, he agrees with him. Not that he _cares_ whether or not the Counselor’s up to something. Florida can look after himself.)

He enters the gym, and the Director and Counselor thankfully stay behind to look on from behind an observation window instead, allowing his AI to finally start to relax. As much as he can seem to relax at all, that is. Florida doesn’t mind, it’s good to be alert. Someone hands him his armor, and he thanks them.

 _ <Blue?> _ his AI asks him incredulously. _ <There’s no accounting for taste, I suppose.> _

“There’s no need to sound so mournful,” he says playfully, putting his armor on. “Blue’s a perfectly fine color!”

A nearby soldier gives him an unnerved look. Hmm, looks like he’ll be getting even more of those now that he’ll be talking to someone inside his head, then. He doesn’t mind that either.

He seals his helmet on, and with that a little holo projection of his AI pops up. Like a little red soldier in his armor, glowing a strong red. Florida smiles at him. His helmet hides it, but the AI might be able to just know.

 _“This_ is a perfectly fine color,” he argues in a gruff voice. Florida thinks he can see all of the scientists behind the observation glass look _very_ interested about this development.

Through another door, some of the other Freelancers enter. North, South, Carolina, and Maine. Florida gives them a cheery wave.

“Hey guys!” he greets them. “Meet my new friend--”

“Sarge,” his AI interrupts him.

(There’s an explosion of interest behind the glass.)

“My new friend _Sarge.”_ What a nice name!

“Nice to meet you, Sarge,” North nods at the little holo projection of Sarge, and Maine does his friendly growl thing. South and Carolina just get into some battle stances at the sight of them. So tense! They should get a massage or something.

“Agent Florida,” a voice rings out through speakers set in the room. “Please spar with your teammates until you are told to stop. Follow the usual sparring rules, with the exception of making sure that you yourself don’t get too seriously hurt. Agents Maine, Carolina, North, and South: you are free to injure Agent Florida as much as you want, short of death.”

A pause.

“What?” North asks.

“You heard him, North,” Carolina says, recovering from her own shock with the aid of having someone else to scold over being shocked.

South cracks her knuckles. “Well, if it’s an order I guess we don’t have much of a choice, do we?” Her excitement for the coming fight is barely contained in her voice.

“I don’t think that lady likes you too much,” Sarge mutters to Florida in an aside. She definitely doesn’t.

“Now, now, I’m sure she’s just looking forward to a good spar! I know I am.” And he is. He can already feel the adrenaline beginning to affect him at the idea of a four against one fight.

Did North just shudder?

“Four against _two,”_ Sarge corrects him, and his holo projection disappears. Back inside of his head in his entirety.

“My apologies,” he says sincerely.

“Anything short of death?” North asks incredulously, but it's in a low enough tone that people can choose to pretend that they didn’t hear him.

“AI… Sarge,” the voice over the speakers says, its robotic voice almost uncertain for a second. Florida feels the AI perk up in his head at his name. “Try and use and learn the special unit installed in Agent Florida’s armor during this fight.”

Sarge brings up his hologram for a moment just so he can do a mini salute and bark “Yes sir!” before disappearing again. _Adorable._

 _ <I am strong and stoic and manly, _ not _adorable, > _Sarge corrects him with a growl.

“Of course,” he says indulgently. Sarge growls in a distinctly unfriendly way at him.

“The fight starts on three,” speaker voice says. “One.”

Maine gets into a runners sprint pose, ready to beeline for him the second they start. No guns, so close quarters combat is pretty much their only option.

“Two.”

Florida idly wonders what the unit they installed in his armor does.

“Three.”

 _ <Let’s kick their behinds!> _Sarge exclaims confidently.

“Let’s,” he agrees, and then Maine collides with him.

It’s like being hit by a truck, which has happened to approximately everyone in the Freelancer program at least once, like a rite of passage. His breath is knocked out of him, and he focuses on getting Maine into a hold that’ll let him flip him off of himself before they stop tumbling across the floor and Maine gets a good grip on him, or else he’s screwed. Maine’s raw strength will beat Florida’s any day of the week.

He manages to get Maine off, and hurriedly gets back onto his feet, only to be immediately tackled back down by South. Right. Four against one.

“I’ve got you now, you bastard--” South snarls, and Florida cuts her off with a punch.

“This isn’t the time for revenge fantasies, South!” North cries out, which gives him just enough time to grit his teeth and turn his face so North’s boot doesn’t break his jaw or his teeth.

Revenge fantasy? Did she resent him for something he’d done? Sure, he’d broken her arm that one time during training, and her ribs during that other time in training, and her jaw and legs during that _other_ time in training, but that had just been in good fun, hadn’t it? He decides to send her a fruit basket once this is over just to be sure.

He uses South’s dazedness from the punch to buck her off and roll onto his front to push himself up, the world spinning in front of his eyes from the kick, but he doesn’t pause for a second even as nausea wells up for him, doesn’t--

Carolina stomps down on his back, slamming him back down onto the ground. He usually excels in sparring, but he’s already getting trounced. Well, it is a four against one.

Wait.

No.

It’s four against _two._

“Sarge,” he grits out, breathless and dazed and pained.

_ <Hang on for one more minute, son! I’ve almost got this unit thingamajig figured out!> _

One minute. He can do one minute. He has to.

“What do we do now?” North asks from above him.

“Like they said,” South pants, getting up from the floor, voice tight and furious. _“Seriously injure.”_

Clearly, he _really_ has to.

He gets his hands underneath him in a flash, and pushes himself up sharply, Carolina’s foot slipping off of him, and finally he’s standing. Surrounded on all sides by his four very competent enemies.

What follows are some of the most grueling yet exciting sixty seconds of his life.

South goes in for a sucker punch while Carolina tries to trip him back down onto the ground. He lets Carolina trip him just to escape the punch, but only lands on his knee, and then he springs up fist first, trajectory firmly headed for Maine’s face. Maine barely reacts to the punch, as always, and takes hold of his arm and _twists,_ and Florida has no choice but to let his body follow the motion or lose that arm for the rest of the fight.

His feet are unsteady on the floor, stance weak and unsteady, arm still in Maine’s grip. North takes the opportunity to punch him in the gut, and Florida barely restrains a wheeze.

He kicks at whoever he can reach, hits _something,_ hears someone yelp, and then South gets him in a headlock. He winds back as best he can and smacks the back of his helmet into her visor. Fact: the visors are the weakest part of their armor, and that includes the back of their helmets. He hears the crunch of glass, and then a torrent of South’s familiar cursing, but her chokehold on him only tightens. He doesn’t try and restrain his laughter, here. North grabs his one remaining free arm as he reaches back towards South.

Carolina steps in front of him.

“Anything short of death,” she repeats to herself lowly.

Florida is being held in place by three Freelancers. He is winded and wounded, can feel blood trickling down his temple inside of his helmet. The number one Freelancer, notorious for her brutality and loyalty to everything the Director orders, is standing in front of him and cracking her knuckles.

He feels so _alive._

She winds up for a punch, and it doesn’t disappoint. Carolina never does.

His eyes won’t focus and his ears are ringing. He tugs against the grips holding him in place. They’re like iron, all of them.

Carolina punches him again.

“Carolina…” North says.

“He’ll be fine,” she says shortly, and then punches him a third time. A fourth.

The speakers don’t crackle back on to stop the fight.

“Hey,” South says. “Can we switch?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Carolina says, and then punches him again. South’s grip on his neck tightens again. It’s getting difficult to breathe.

Another fifteen seconds like this passes without words, only the sound of armored knuckles hitting armored flesh ringing out, of armor _cracking._

_ <Got it.> _

And suddenly, everything’s fine. The amount he can breathe is fine. The solid holds on his body are fine. His swiftly accumulating injuries are fine. The iron punches that are raining down on him are fine. Barely registers.

He can’t feel any pain.

 _ <Go get ‘em, soldier,> _ Sarge orders, and Florida springs to it.

He twists out of the grips the other Freelancers have on him easily, just powering through the resistance this time, his arms making a very fascinating wet crackling noise that he’s only ever heard on other people seconds before he’s killed them. South springs away from him, letting out a shocked and disgusted sound, North echoing her.

Maine immediately punches him, throwing his entire weight behind it, Florida’s face snapping to the side. He doesn’t feel it.

Nothing hurts. All of the grueling has been taken out, and now there’s nothing but excitement left to be felt.

“Sarge, you are just a _peach,”_ he praises his AI as he immediately attacks Maine right back, who clearly hadn’t been expecting him to recover so quickly or so casually from his devastating assault.

He feels South jump onto his back and start trying to choke him out in earnest now, and just ignores her. She lets out an offended yowl at this.

 _ <The peachiest,> _ Sarge agrees gleefully. _ <Now kick him in the jewels!> _

Florida takes the suggestion, driving his knee so hard up into Maine’s crotch that he hears something _crack,_ whether that be the armor on his knee, Maine’s codpiece, or his kneecap, Florida doesn’t know or particularly care. Maine doesn’t seem like much of a fan either way, which frees Florida to reach up with his hands to just nonchalantly rip South off of himself and toss her to the side, straight into North who had been preparing a lunge of his own.

He turns around and Carolina is there.

“Round two?” he asks in good cheer, raising his fists.

She doesn’t reply with words. She doesn’t need to.

What follows is bloody, and brutal, and _fun._ As they continue, Carolina gradually begins to slow down. Florida doesn’t. Florida is above pain now, and can just focus all of his attention on the fight now, on the adrenaline and that ecstatic, addictive buzzing he gets in his head whenever he hurts someone.

North and South makes several more attempts to jump into the fray, and he just smacks them out of the air like flies, away and to the side. Maine tries as well, but Carolina gives him a _look_ and he backs off without a word (not that he’s ever been particularly talkative in the first place), seemingly content with being just a spectator.

“Not gonna cry uncle?” she pants after a particularly acrobatic kick that he just shrugs off. “You’re starting to look pretty messed up, Florida.”

Is he?

“You must be in a lot of pain.”

He isn’t.

“You don’t want to do any permanent damage, do you?”

Well.

So long as he’s got Sarge, does it matter?

_ <I’ll tell you when you’re getting close to permanent damage. She’s just trying to psyche you out. Psychological warfare, the dirtiest trick in the book! Psyche her back, son!> _

Listening to Sarge’s advice has worked out well for him so far. He reaches up and takes his helmet off. Smiles at Carolina.

She actually _flinches_ back at what she sees. He hears the twins swearing softly off to the side. _His fucking face--_

“To you or to me?” he asks her, his tone far more pleasant than his words, and he casually tosses the helmet off to the side. _I don’t need armor to beat you,_ he says with his actions.

Predictably, prideful Carolina doesn’t take well to that. So much so, in fact, that she grows sloppy. She rips her helmet off, forcibly evening the odds, and lunges at him. Her teeth are bared, her eyes narrowed with concentration and rage, cheeks red with effort, forehead glistening with sweat.

Florida wishes he could see the faces of the people he’s fighting all of the time.

 _ <So you can see the light fade in their eyes!> _Sarge enthusiastically agrees.

Florida punches her so hard her head snaps back, blood spurting from her nose and spraying in an arc with the motion of her head. He watches the blood catch the light as it falls through the air.

“Something like that,” he says, and punches her again.

Soon, she doesn’t have the time or presence of mind to punch back. Soon, she’s staggering backwards with his blows, and he steadily follows her. Soon, she’ll--

“Stop fighting,” the Director curtly orders over the speakers.

Florida stops his fist from connecting a fraction of a second before it lands. Carolina sways on her feet before him, but she refuses to fall. It’d just take one more hit, he knows it, can _feel_ it.

He lets his hand fall to his side instead, and focuses on his expression so it doesn’t fall into a pout. He isn’t wearing his helmet, after all.

 _ <Psht, coward. _We won.>

“No arguments here,” he says, spirits cheering already, blood dripping from his knuckles. Having an AI is nice, he decides. Nicer than he could have ever possibly imagined.

It turns out that that four against two is much more manageable than four against one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The illustration was done by the incredible [toastyhat!](https://toastyhat.tumblr.com/) Check her stuff out!


	2. really great friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> North is not the first person to receive an AI in the program, so he thankfully goes into it with a bit of an understanding of what it might be like.

North is not the first person to receive an AI in the program, so he thankfully goes into it with a bit of an understanding of what it might be like. 

“You have to understand,” the Counselor tells him, “for your AI it will be like it went from not existing at all to suddenly  _ being. _ It’s a little overwhelming and disorienting, from what we can tell. You can expect your AI to perhaps be scared, maybe angry, and almost definitely confused. In the end, how it will react will come down to what sort of personality it has, so you’ll just have to have an open mind and be prepared to respond to anything.” 

“Just like a mission, then,” he says with a smile, because it is, and he wants to let the Counselor know that he’s prepared to handle this. (And he wants to distract from any miniscule tells that might have escaped him when the Counselor called the AI an ‘it’ even though he’s heard Florida refer to his as a ‘he’ in conversation. North doesn’t like creating conflict when he can avoid it, the Counselor probably didn’t even mean anything by it.) 

So. North is prepared for a negative reaction, to help calm the AI down if they need it. 

And  _ boy _ is there a negative reaction. 

North’s AI drops into his head like a cold ball of ice, his mental presence radiating dizzyingly intense fear and dread, and North gets his first disorienting dose of being able to literally sense someone else’s emotions, feeling the fear and at the same time not. He can feel the terror but it’s not his. All  _ he’s _ feeling is shock, at the foreign feeling of someone else in his mind for the first time in his life, at just how scared the AI is. And, an emotion he’s more than familiar with, concern. 

The concern wins out, as usual. 

“Hey, it’s okay,” he says, keeping his voice soft. “It’s going to be okay.” 

_ <Those are lies,> _ his AI shoots back immediately. 

“No, they’re not. Come on. Everything’s fine, see?” 

North looks around the room for the AI, assuming he can see everything North can see. Nothing but weedy, soft people in lab coats everywhere. All the armed guards are outside, out of sight. 

_ <Armed guards!?> _

Ah. So… white lies weren’t going to be a thing, then. 

“Just for in case something happens,” he rushes to reassure him. “We’re only the second ones to do this, after all. And everything looks like it’s going just fine, right?” He looks to a technician at his side at this. 

She looks a little blank, and it occurs to him that she’s only getting about half of their conversation. It’s enough for her to nod though. 

“How do you feel, Agent North?” 

“Good.” 

“Can you feel it?” 

Obviously. A routine question, then. 

“He,” North gently corrects her, hoping she won’t make a big deal out of it. 

She gives him a peculiar look, and then gets a little faraway look in her eyes that tells him someone's speaking into her comm. 

“How do you know that it’s a he?” she asks him. 

North opens his mouth to answer. Closes it. Thinks. “I just… know.” 

Huh. That’s a little weird, now that he thinks about it. What’s up with that? 

_ <Don’t ask me, dude,> _ his AI says, apparently beginning to calm down as the armed guards continue not to swarm the operating theatre to execute them.  _ <I just started existing. Hang on…> _ North experiences the most uncanny feeling of someone rapidly going through his memories. _ <Freelancers, North, AI… I’m your partner?> _

North feels his lips tug up into a smile and he lets them, satisfied that his AI seems thoroughly distracted from his fear now. “I like to think of it that way, yes. I’m North.” 

_ <Grif.> _

“Nice to meet you, Grif.” 

There’s an immediate reaction to this, and it isn’t from Grif. Someone comes and brings him his armor and tells him to put it on as the scientists mutter to each other and into their comms, and he bemusedly follows orders. He stands there fully armored for a moment as the technicians look at him impatiently, as if they’re waiting for something. 

“Your  _ AI,”  _ one of the technicians prods him. He could have just said Grif. “Bring it out.”

_ <Assholes,> _ Grif decides, and North doesn’t have it in him to disagree. 

“Wanna come out, Grif?” 

“Fine,” he says flatly, like a surly teenager forced out of their room to spend time with the family. (It reminds him of South, when they were younger. It makes him feel fond.) Grif’s holo flickers on, reminding him a lot of the one he’d seen Sarge make. A little armored man, except this one’s a yellow-orange, and looks fatter too. Why would an AI make himself look fat? … Well, why would an AI make themselves look like anything, really. 

The Counselor and the Director walk into the room, and Grif’s holo flickers so quickly North wouldn’t be sure he’d actually seen it if it weren’t for the explosion of paralyzed terror that washes over his brain at the same time. 

“We would like to ask ‘Grif’ some questions now,” the Counselor says. 

North would be busy debating with himself whether he’s happy the Counselor used Grif’s name or upset at the tone in which he said it, if it weren’t for the distracting way the fear spiked to nauseating degrees when the Counselor spoke up. 

  
  


_ “Anyone will do,” the Counselor finally answers him.  _

  
  


North blinks himself back into dizzy focus to see the Counselor looking at the two of them expectantly. North clears his throat, forces himself to shunt the confusing… whatever that was, to the back of his mind. 

“I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” he asks for Grif, whose holo is still suspiciously frozen. 

“Why is Grif your name?” the Director asks impatiently, cutting off the Counselor before he can do more than open his mouth. 

“Uh,” Grif says, breaking out of his trance, focusing on the Director. “It just… is? It feels right? I dunno, man, wait until I’m more than five minutes old before you break out the interrogation, huh?” 

North stiffens and thins his lip to hide any visible or audible reaction to witnessing someone being so casually rude to the Director, whether that reaction be deep amusement or profound horror. A mix, perhaps? He’s just grateful he’s wearing his helmet. 

The Director and the Counselor exchange looks. They’re both stoic men in their own ways, hard to read, but North thinks he can see something like relief in their expressions at Grif’s answer. 

_ <Playing dumb is always the right answer,> _ Grif says inside his head, even though his holo’s still out. North twitches, but the Director and the Counselor aren’t looking at him at the moment. 

If North could speak freely, he’d say that that was one of the most cynical things he’s ever heard. 

_ <Hey, you can’t argue with the results, right? We’re not in trouble yet.> _

Hmm, maybe this silent communication thing is manageable after all. It certainly would be nice to not be having apparently one sided conversations with himself to all outside observers, the way Florida does now, like he wasn’t creepy enough before. That may just be mostly because of the _ kind _ of conversations he has with his AI though; Sarge definitely seems to have a much less hidden lust for violence. He feels a pulse of smug excitement from Grif at the idea of having entirely imperceptible conversations in front of other people. 

Also,  _ yet?  _ Grif better not be  _ planning _ to get in trouble. 

_ <A little stealthy rule breaking never hurt anyone.> _

Actually, that sounds like something that’s definitely hurt people before--

“We will now test your unit,” the Director declares, pulling North out of his silent conversation. 

An image of Florida that’s burned into his skull springs forth in front of his mind’s eye: Florida, in armor but lacking his helmet, long dark hair almost entirely out of his braid, smiling a ghoulish excited smile with teeth entirely coated in blood, blood in the white of his right sclera, nose broken, gashes littered over his face from the beatdown he’d received, arms held at the ready to deal more punches despite the way they  _ bent _ in a way arms definitely shouldn’t, Carolina swaying in front of him, her face almost a ruin--

_ <Dude, gross!> _

North snaps out of it. 

“Um… What does my unit do, exactly?” he asks. 

“We will want to see if your AI can figure that out without any clues,” the Counselor gently shuts him down with a mild apologetic smile. 

North hopes to god he doesn’t get the same unit as Florida. That would be redundant, wouldn’t it? Feeling pain might be unpleasant, but he thinks he’d prefer it over what Florida’s got going on now. 

From the way Grif’s radiating how unsettled he is, he thinks he’s not alone in that. 

North leaves for the gym, and he tries to take a path that will keep him the most amount away from the Counselor without even thinking about it as he does so. Instinctive. 

The quiet man radiates a sense of danger to North in a way he never had before. 

North enters the gym. Some of the other Freelancers do so as well a moment later. Carolina and Florida are still on medical rest, and he’s grateful to see that South isn’t here either. She can get pretty heated up about competitions. It’s York, Maine, Wash, and Connie. He waves at them. 

“Hey, guys!” he says. 

“Hey, glad to see your brain didn’t melt out of your ears!” York replies. Maine gives him a stoic nod, Connie a wave back. 

“What are they like? Your AI?” Wash asks, immediately zeroing in on what excites him the most. 

“Grif’s great,” he says, his mouth tugging into a smile on its own. He hasn’t known him for long, admittedly, but he likes Grif so far. He thinks they could be really good friends. 

Grif doesn’t have anything to say in reply to that, but North can feel how flustered he gets. 

_ <Fuck off!> _ he barks, immediately getting  _ more _ flustered at noticing North noticing how flustered he is. Sucks to be him; all it does is remind North of his aggressively defensive sister, who he loves

  
  


_ Sister _

  
  


“--ne… two… three!” a voice over the speakers says, and North blinks himself back into focus just in time for the not particularly comforting sight of Maine _ throwing  _ Connie at him as Wash and York sprint in his direction. Oh, shit. 

He quickly dodges the Connie projectile, and he notes to keep it mind that she’s at his back now as the other three close in. 

“Grif, the unit!” he barks, because he can feel that Grif’s just as disoriented and confused by whatever just happened as he is. 

_ <Uh, shit, right!> _

York reaches him first, and they manage to exchange and break out of six different holds before Wash reaches him, which is when things start to get more complicated. 

He punches Wash hard in the solar plexus. It clearly knocks the wind out of him, but he goes in for another hold without pausing anyways. The brief moment his focus is diverted on getting out of that, York takes the opportunity to elbow him in the visor. His head snaps back, and he wonders if he just got whiplash as he staggers and punches blindly. 

He can hear Maine’s thundering footsteps, coming closer. Fuck, he has to do something before he reaches him or else he’s going to end up just as messed up as Florida. 

North pulls a dirty trick that he prefers to keep in reserve because it makes him feel kind of bad, but also because the more often he pulls it the better York is going to get at working around it. North goes for York’s blind spot, his injured eye, and manages to trip him up, and even into Wash’s legs at that. They both fall to the floor with undignified squawks, and North grins as he moves to move away--

Connie tackles him to the ground right along with everyone else. 

He’d forgotten to keep in mind that she was at his back now. 

Suddenly, he’s in a confusing tangle of limbs, all of them hostile. Literally the only upside here is that everyone else seems just as confused as he. He almost even gets out, prying himself loose of holds as agitated swearing rings out around him, but then--

Maine stomps down on his wrist. 

North can’t stop a cry from escaping him in time, but he realizes that Maine’s going easy on him. His wrist isn’t pulverized, after all. 

Connie, crawling over him onto his back. Wash, sitting down on his legs. 

“Gotcha,” York breathes, standing up. “Feel like surrendering?” 

Damn. He hadn’t even lasted as long as Florida before being successfully pinned. The leaderboard is such bullshit. 

_ <Fuck, I think I’ve got it,> _ Grif mutters, which is all the warning North gets before a yellow bubble expands out from his armor, shoving all of the other Freelancers off of him on the way. 

North blinks incredulously as he slowly sits up, looking around himself at the yellow tinted world.

“Okay, that’s a neat trick,” Connie admits, voice muffled through the shield. 

It’s definitely better than being able to turn off your pain, that’s for damn sure. 

_ “So _ cool,” Wash says in a hushed voice, rubbing the back of his head where he presumably hit it as the yellow shield catapulted him away.  

_ <I think it’s more of an orange color,> _ Grif says, sounding a little incredulous as well, but proud too. 

“Agree to disagree,” he says, and then lets himself smile as Maine knocks experimentally on the shield to no effect. “Good job, Grif.” 

_ <... Thanks.> _

North thinks they could be really  _ great _ friends. 


	3. the person you love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> York is strapped down to the table when he comes back to himself.

York is not the first Freelancer to get an AI. He’s talked to North about it, and even managed to make himself have a conversation longer than one minute with Florida, which was definitely disconcerting. That guy’s got multiple layers of creepy going on. Anyways, York is prepared. 

Or rather, York _ thought _ he was prepared. 

Florida says Sarge was angry, North that Grif was scared (which said AI was indignant enough about North admitting to that he projected himself just to tell everyone about his Freelancer’s lactose intolerance), so that’s what York’s expecting. Something like that, something negative that’ll calm down in five minutes. 

York eats, works out, has awesome unspoken-I-hope-you-don’t-die-tomorrow sex with Carolina, showers, and sleeps. Doesn’t eat breakfast on the doctor’s recommendation. Gets wished luck by most of the guys, and gets escorted to the operating theatre, is told to put on some unflattering scrubs and not much else. Whatever, he’s totally rocking these scrubs. Lies down on a table face down. Endures the horribly unsettling, foreign, invasive feeling of something connecting with the port in the back of his neck for the first time. 

Feels

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


York is strapped down to the table when he comes back to himself. The guards that had been waiting outside are now inside of the theatre, looking tense and wary, fingering their weapons as they stare intently at him. 

Something is inside his brain that’s never been there before. Not just an AI, but sheer uncontrolled _ panic. _ York can feel tears streaming down his face, can’t remember the last time he cried. 

“Ffffuck?” he asks, more confused than anything else. His heart is galloping. His knuckles sting. Are there less technicians in the room than there had been? 

_ <cantmovecantmovecantmoveICANTMOVE> _

York reflexively begins to struggle against the straps holding him down. “Lemme go,” he slurs. Did someone punch him in the jaw? Sure feels like it. 

_ <havetoMOVEgetoutgetoutGETOUT> _

“Let. Me. Go.” He can’t stop straining against the straps even though he knows it’s fruitless. Can barely think past the panic clouding his mind. This wasn’t how North had described it. This is beyond any fear he’s ever felt before. 

“Are you back to yourself, Agent York?” the Director asks, his tone exuding disdain. 

“Hhhh,” York struggles to breathe evenly, normally. “How long was I…?” 

He’s lost time, he realizes. That seriously doesn’t help with the fear. 

“About an hour, now.” 

He’s losing circulation, struggling against the straps like this. Can’t stop. 

_ <havetogetoutofhereimgoingtodie> _

He just has to… breathe evenly. Take deep breaths. Close his eyes. Let his thundering heart slow. Remember what North said: this isn’t his fear. 

“I believe you’re having your first panic attack, York,” the Counselor soothingly explains. 

It has the exact opposite intended effect. At the sound of the Counselor’s voice, the fear somehow  _ strengthens, _ there’s somehow  _ more,  _ how is there _ more-- _

_ <IMGOINGTODIE> _

It’s like there’s a brand new hole in York’s head, a black hole that’s sucking in all of his sanity and composure. He’s going to  _ die.  _ He knows it. He can feel it. It doesn’t make sense, except it makes all of the sense in the world. He  _ has _ to move. He  _ has _ to get out of here. 

York’s going to die. This is what dying feels like. Makes sense. 

He hears footsteps approaching him where he’s _ trapped  _ and  _ dying, _ the Counselor’s footsteps, the Counselor’s voice saying, 

  
  


_ “Don’t worry, we’ll make sure you forget all of this.”  _

_ He doesn’t even hear him, his words don’t even sink in. The Counselor and his men and his machine and his gun are approaching him, but he can’t bring himself to look away from _

  
  


“--breathe with me. In… and out. In… and out.” 

Eventually, York starts following orders. Eventually, he starts breathing properly again. Eventually, he stops crying, stops uselessly struggling against his bindings. His heart calms down, his thoughts become rational again. 

But the fear that isn’t his doesn’t shrink in the slightest. 

-

York doesn’t spar against his teammates like Florida and North did, because he keeps having to say no to a certain question.  _ Does your AI seem mentally coherent?  _

They keep him in the medical bay, although thankfully not restrained any longer. He’d apparently attacked some of the technicians immediately after the implementation, rather blindly and incompetently, but still. So, he’s got a couple of guards. 

He lies there with his eyes closed, trying to coax his AI out from where he’s trying to hide deep within York’s mind. 

“We should have inspected their files more thoroughly beforehand,” the Director says, just on the edge of being able to be heard. Standing in the doorway? 

“I’m sure this will pass soon,” the Counselor says, instantly undoing any progress York made in the last hour. “It says here that it was just a common anxiety disorder--”

And then they pass out of hearing range. Just walking by. 

_ <imgoingtodie> _

“No, you’re not, buddy,” he repeats for what feels like the one thousandth time. He’d be starting to feel exasperated around now if he couldn’t literally feel how scared he is, so. York just tries to remain calming and calm. 

_ <hesgoingtokillme> _

“Who?” 

“Having a riveting conversation?” Carolina asks, and York opens his eyes and smiles tiredly. Maybe his AI will benefit from being left alone for a little bit. Hey, York’s had a rough day too. 

“He’s still kind of in panic mode,” he says, turning his head to look at her. Ah, a sight for sore eyes, even with the colorful bruises splashed across her face, a red splotch of burst capillaries in her left sclera, her broken nose still healing. She had to get two teeth replaced after what Florida did to her. He hopes the Director’s no doubt short and dispassionate yet scathing reprimand will stop her from taking off her helmet during an armored fist fight ever again. She puts a lot of stock in his opinion and orders, maybe even more than she should. Carolina’s wearing a tank and shorts, no doubt fresh from yet another workout. He seriously appreciates the unhindered view of her incredible biceps. She sits down on his bed, ignoring the guards nearby. 

He enjoys how close she is. 

“Do you think he’ll calm down any time soon?” 

“Well, he has to eventually, right?” he says trying to inject more confidence into that question than he feels. It’s been several hours now, and so far he’s felt nothing but fear from his AI. But he’s just having a particularly tough activation, is all. Has to be all. 

Carolina makes an aborted movement towards his face with her hands, visibly remembers the guards, stops it, and frowns. York suddenly resents their presence where before he’d been fine with it. 

“You’ve been crying,” she points out. “You’ve never…”

“Hey, it doesn’t count if it’s AI-induced, alright?” 

Carolina rolls her eyes.  _ “Boys.”  _

“You say that like you’re  _ not _ the proudest person on the ship.” 

“Proud with reason,” she huffs, only half serious. Only half joking. York can’t help a fond smile. “Get it together soon, okay? I want to see what kind of unit you have.”

“Roger that, sir,” he says with a little salute. 

She squeezes his hand quickly, furtively, and then she leaves. She was here for such a short time, but he already feels so much better. 

Being around the person you love is so

  
  


_ I love you.  _

_ It’s so important for him to say it. It’s never been more important for him to say it.  _

_ The words stick in his throat, his lungs struggle for air, and he can do nothing but sob without meaning to.  _

_ He’s running out of time.  _

_ I love you.  _

_ He has to say it.  _

_ I love you.  _

_ He has to speak up.  _

_ I love you.  _

_ He has to say it  _ now--

  
  


York comes back to himself again, blinking dazedly up at the ceiling, not knowing where he is for a moment. Then he frowns up at it, confused and kind of pissed off. Goddamnit, these weird… flash things weren’t a one time thing, apparently. What the fuck is up with them? What is going on with his head? They don’t even make any sense, completely out of context nonsense. Is the implantation making him lose his mind? 

“York?” North asks, and York freezes up a little and then looks at him. North, standing at his bedside in full armor. How did York not notice that until now? How out of it was he? For how  _ long  _ was he out of it? He could ask the guards how long it’s been since Carolina left. 

He looks to them only to see that there are entirely new guards. 

He decides not to ask anyone. 

“Yeah?” he asks, and then licks his suddenly dry lips. He wouldn’t really have guessed that North would have visited him, at least not before certain other Freelancers; they’re not the closest, and probably wouldn't even be as close as they are if there were more people to choose from the Program to hang out with. 

“I just wanted to…” he says, and there’s a certain hang-dog quality to his voice. “I’m sorry my advice wasn’t good.” 

York blinks at him, and then takes a deep breath and sighs quietly through his nose. Smiles. “It’s fine, dude. I’m literally only the third person to ever do this, we’ve kind of got a limited-data problem. And it  _ did _ help, at least a little. I just think mine’s a little more… nervous, than yours.” 

And now that he’s thinking about his AI, he’s been silent for a long time now, actually. Has he calmed down any? He mentally pokes him, and gets a wave of mindless fear for his troubles, just like last time. York restrains another sigh. 

“Well, I hope you guys get along better soon. Grif and I--” 

Grif’s holo pops up, interrupting North. “Dude, you have to stop casually saying sappy stuff, okay? Nobody wants to listen to that. You make us sound like fawning newlyweds.” 

And the fear just… stalls. 

_ <Who is that?> _ his AI breathes, his first sentence that hasn’t been a fearful rush since York got him. 

York is flabbergasted. York is…  _ so _ pleasantly surprised. He smiles, wide and genuine. 

“That’s North’s AI, Grif,” he says. So all he had to do to calm him down was introduce him to another AI?  _ Done.  _ “Want me to tell him your name for you?”

He’d poke him into just doing it himself, except York isn’t currently wearing any of his armor, so no projection capabilities. Later. 

_ <I’m Simmons.> _

Simmons. York has been unable to get that out of him until now. It feels so good, to have him respond to his questions, to not have that pulsing fear in his head any longer, like a throbbing headache finally relieved. 

“If he’s like Sarge, forget it,” Grif grumps, crossing his arms. The two AI didn’t get along, apparently. 

York recalls Sarge’s violent confidence and Simmons’ frozen fear. “Definitely not,” he assures him. “Simmons is pretty different.” 

Grif’s holo seems to stutter for a moment. 

“... Simmons? That's, uh. An okay name.” 

North turns his head to look at the holo floating to his side. “... Someone you--?”

“I know everyone you know and that’s it, dumbass,” Grif shuts North’s question down. “It’s just. A good name.” 

_ <Grif’s a good name too,> _ Simmons says, sounding like, no, _ feeling _ like he can’t take his focus off Grif’s shining little form. The fear is entirely forgotten. 

York can’t believe he’s about to arrange a playdate for his Artificial Intelligence. 


	4. i.e explosively

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, South is going to get an AI. And she  _ deserves _ it, and she’s going to  _ kick ass _ with it, and she’s not going to be a little baby about it. It’s not going to be crazy like Sarge, lazy like Grif, or neurotic like Simmons. 
> 
> Her AI? Is going to be a fucking badass. 

South is the fourth person to get an AI, and frankly, it’s about fucking time. She finally had the chance to kick Florida’s ass, and she lost it. North has an AI, and she can’t get through a single conversation with him without him bringing it up in some way. Freaking  _ York _ got an AI, and all he did with it was have a meltdown and then not even give her a fight once he’d calmed down. 

So, South is going to get an AI. And she  _ deserves _ it, and she’s going to  _ kick ass _ with it, and she’s not going to be a little baby about it. It’s not going to be crazy like Sarge, lazy like Grif, or neurotic like Simmons. 

Her AI? Is going to be a fucking badass. 

When her AI enters her mind, he’s scared. She’d have prefered angry, but fine. She can deal. She can  _ make him _ calm down. 

“Hey,” she says. “CALM DOWN.” 

The technicians flinch away from her, but what’s more interesting is feeling someone try and flinch away from her _ inside of her own head.  _

“No, I said CALM!  _ DOWN!!”  _

“Agent, would you please--” a technician tries. 

“Don’t try to tell me what to do with my own AI,” she snaps at her, and then turns her focus back on the only other person that  _ matters  _ in this room. 

She’s pleased to see/feel that he’s already taking all of his negative emotions, rolling them up into a ball, and locking them somewhere far away. Not how she’d prefer to deal with it (i.e explosively), but that works too. 

_ <Sorry,> _ he says.  _ <Who are you? I’m Donut.> _

“Dumb name, I’m South.” 

_ <Like the direction on a map…?> _ he asks with perfectly polite puzzlement that South sees right through. She already assumes the worst of people because that’s always the truth, but now she’s sharing headspace with someone and it’s easier than ever to see right through the lies and facades: that was nothing more than a petty revenge jab for the ‘dumb name’ thing. It endears and pisses her off at the same time in equal measure. 

“It’s a _ code name, _ dumbass.” 

“Agent South, how do you feel?” the technician rudely interrupts their conversation. 

“As if,” South says, and swings her legs off the table and leaves the room. She didn’t join Project Freelancer or get an AI injected into her brain so she could do Q&A with the eggheads or talk about her  _ feelings.  _ She’s here for one thing and one thing only (North--), and that’s to  _ kick ass.  _

_ <We can kick ass  _ and _ talk about our feelings, > _ Donut says as South gets a weird tingly feeling in the back of her head, like someone rapidly flipping through files in a cabinet. 

“Fine,” South grants, because her brother’s talked her goddamned ears off about compromise her entire life and maybe a little something’s sunk in by now. “But only if they’re threatening or intimidating feelings.  _ Cool _ feelings.” 

Donut doesn’t feel satisfied with this compromise, but he doesn’t say anything about it so whatever. _ Someone _ wasn’t happy to compromise, clearly. And people call  _ her _ undiplomatic. 

“Agent South!” someone cries out behind her. She doesn’t look to see who it was; it wasn’t the Director, who’s basically the only person she has to listen to here because he’s like the principal or whatever, so it doesn’t matter. “Where are you going!?” 

“To the gym!” she shouts back over her shoulder, striding on determinedly past confused and hesitant guards. She gives them her best, sharpest smile as she casually shoulder checks them aside. “Send my armor--with the unit!--and my sparring partners on ahead.” 

God, she hopes Florida’s one of her sparring partners so she can make him eat dirt. 

God, she’d _ better _ have a fucking cool unit. 

South makes it to the gym first, of course, and ends up being the first and only person there for a while. She stands there impatiently tapping her foot for a while, arms crossed, fingers drumming, until she gives up with a frustrated snort and starts warming up for her match instead. She’ll be  _ damned _ if she’s going to lose this one. 

_ <It’s important to stretch and work yourself open before you start a rigorous session with your partners!> _ Donut chimes in as South reaches down to her toes. Her brows furrow. 

“Work myself open…?” 

_ <Oops, I mean work yourself _ loose.>

There’s a sense of amused  _ mischief _ coming from Donut and it makes her eyes narrow with suspicion, but then a guard abruptly slams through the gym doors while holding her armour, thoroughly distracting her. 

“About time!” she barks at him. 

“You were supposed to stay for the--”

“Just give me my armor,” she snaps, snatches it out of his hands before he can comply, and starts strapping it on. 

As soon as the last piece clicks into place she says, “Figure out what our unit does, Donut.” because she’s not a dumbass that’ll wait until the last minute like those other guys. She’s gonna  _ curbstomp _ whoever they put in front of her. 

<Gently  _ curbstomp?> _ Donut suggests, but gets started on figuring out the unit straightaway. South approves, but she still snorts contemptuously at the question. 

“We won’t kill them, how’s that for gentle?” 

“Impressive going by your standards?” a familiar voice says from the doorway. 

Ah, fuck. 

South turns to see North. 

Here’s the thing: her brother’s an infuriating, condescending, overbearing jerk who’s got everyone fooled thinking he’s the nicest guy on the planet when in reality he’s hospitalized almost as many guys as South has in bar fights (never mind that she was the one who started most of those bar fights), probably laughs inside his head when people fuck up in front of him every time, and  _ definitely _ enjoys it a bit too much when he gets an excuse to use the  _ fun _ weapons on enemies. He’s just as big of an asshole as South is, he just hides it better. Or tries to hide it all. South thinks he’s an annoying, hypocritical buzzkill and she’s  _ right, _ but--

But. 

She still doesn’t want to seriously hurt him. 

_ <Awww,> _ Donut coos. 

Oh fuck, someone can hear her when she’s accidentally sappy inside of her head now. She reminds herself to threaten him to stay silent once the fight’s over. 

_ <I can just pinky swear you instead?> _ Donut suggests.  _ <Uh. Mental pinky swear.> _

Maine enters the room just behind North. And then, Wyoming, who South will enjoy making pay for forcing her to listen to all of those shitty knock knock jokes. And then--

Carolina. 

Now  _ there’s  _ someone South wants to seriously injure. She can take it, can’t she, prissy Miss Perfect? 

South cracks her knuckles. Buzzkill not-expendable brother present or no, she’s going to  _ enjoy  _ this. 

“Normal sparring rules are in effect,” a voice crackles over the speakers. The ship’s AI she thinks, with some shitty librarian lady name cobbled together out of a terrible acronym. “As is the usual warning: South, do not seriously harm your teammates.” 

South glares up at the ceiling. This is such  _ bullshit.  _ Shouldn’t she be able to test out her unit to her heart’s contents? For science or something? 

_ <Ooh, do I detect a hint of cattiness there? South, you should totally befriend that woman, I feel like she’d be  _ super _ fun to hang out with after a couple of margaritas. > _

“She’s a dumb AI, dumbass,” she grumbles. 

_ <Well, there’s no need to stoop to name calling!> _ he huffs, and South neither knows nor cares whether he was referring to himself or the AI. 

“Don’t you want to introduce your AI, South?” North calls out. 

Donut immediately projects himself into a shining little pink man hovering over her shoulder just so he can bounce excitedly on the tips of his toes. “Ooh, ooh, oh, yes! Introductions!” 

South barely stops herself from smacking a hand against her visor.  _ Why. _ And in front of  _ Carolina,  _ too. And her brother! 

Donut clearly and shamelessly ignores the wave of embarrassment she’s sure she just emanated inside of her own skull. 

“I’m Donut,” Donut says proudly, like that name’s anything to be proud of. “And you must be North! I’ve already heard so many stray thoughts about you! And Carolina! Nothing but good things, sort of, if you squint and think about it in a roundabout way! And what about the two handsome gentlemen in white?” 

Oh god, is that a hint of  _ interest _ she feels as Donut glances in Maine’s direction? 

Well… he is pretty big and tall and strong, and almost never talks, so he never has a chance to make a dumbass out of himself and lose her respect. A much worse thought suddenly occurs to her. Oh fuck, what if she and Donut have the same taste in men? For some reason, the thought is unbearably mortifying. 

South considers how much of a twink vibe Donut is giving off. 

Well, at least they probably don’t have the same taste in women. 

“Grif, stop groaning, it’s rude,” North mutters. Does he not realize that no one but him would know about that if he’d just kept his mouth shut? Dumbass. 

“Maine,” Maine says, which is the first thing South’s heard out of him in weeks now. 

“And I’m Wyoming, pleasure to make your acquaintance,” Wyoming says with a polite little nod that is for some reason one of the most irritating things South has ever witnessed. Probably because Wyoming did it. Ugh, Wyoming. 

“Match starting on three. One,” Donut’s holo turns off with a parting wave, and he goes back to working away on the unit which is what he should have been focusing on in the first fucking place anyways, “two,” everyone gets into battle stances, “three.”

South doesn’t wait for them to come to her. 

Carolina is the fastest, and South hates her the most, so she’s the one she collides with first. Two objects at high speeds, rushing to meet each other. The impact is bone rattling. 

South is heavier, so they  _ ought _ to go tumbling ass over teakettle Carolina first, but Carolina’s footwork and reflexes are infuriatingly flawless, and so they instead just smack to a standstill, straining against each other, momentum slamming to its fullest against them. South grits her teeth and pushes against her as hard as she can. Carolina pushes back. For a long moment, neither of them budges. 

And then, South’s left foot skids an inch backwards across the floor. 

This is why she hates Carolina more than anyone. 

North barrels past them, and on his way he briefly crouches, not giving up his momentum, and he brings out his arm to sweep her leg out from under her, sending her tumbling into Carolina’s chest plate. North never hesitates to give her a good fight during sparring; the lack of coddling from him is always refreshing. 

Slightly less refreshing when it gives Carolina an opportunity to get her into a good, solid hold. South struggles against it, snarling, falling back into wild, jerking, strong movements with as much weight behind them as she can muster in a fraction of a second instead of going for the predictable accepted counter maneuvers they’ve all been coached on. Carolina’s been taught them as well, after all, and she’s seen how well they work against her too. It actually works for a second, for a moment, long enough for her to get enough room between the two of them that she can snap up with her fist into a  _ beautiful _ uppercut. 

She’s going to fondly remember the sound her reinforced glove made when it crashed against the chin of Carolina’s helmet for the rest of her life, she swears to herself. 

She presses her advantage, headbutting Carolina before she has a moment to regather her composure--

Maine doesn’t yank her back, he just  _ picks her up,  _ ripping her out of Carolina’s hold. South decides she hates him after all. She turns on him the way a cat not ready to be picked up would, yowling furiously like one as well. His grip on her just tightens, and she knows there’ll be hand shaped bruises there tomorrow, and not even in the hot way. 

“Hold her still for me, would you?” Wyoming politely requests. Oh,  _ fuck no.  _

She’d rather burn the entire ship down than let Wyoming humiliate her. 

_ <Well, that’s good to know, because it might just come to that!> _ Donut suddenly speaks up.  _ <I figured it out, South! And it’s a _ good one. _ Reach your hand out in his direction. > _

South reaches her hand out in Wyoming’s direction. Wyoming, squaring up just outside of her reach, doesn’t even bother batting her hand away. 

_ <And whenever you want me to trigger the unit, you just do that and think--> _ excitement bleeds through his voice, through her head, pouring into every crack and crevice in her brain, permeating her and him and everything is good and wonderful and sharp  _ <\--boom.> _

There’s a boom. 

There’s a whole lot more than a boom. 

Heat that she can feel even through her armor, brief but intense, her visor dimming for a flicker of a second as light consumes everything in front of her, all sound cutting off before the sound washes over her, like the world’s stopped existing, like she wiped everything clean. 

When it’s over (it was so  _ short, _ so  _ quick), _ it becomes clear to her that everyone else’s armor hadn’t immediately compensated for the light and the noise like hers had. Not even North’s. Maine drops her. Carolina is cradling her helmeted head. North is on his knees. Wyoming has been blasted to the other side of the room, and he isn’t moving. 

“You were told no serious injuries, Agent South,” the voice over the speakers says sternly, like a kindergarten teacher scolding a kid for pulling a classmate’s hair. 

_ <Oh, I’m sure he’s fine!> _ Donut says dismissively.  _ <My calculations are sound. He just needs some aftercare!> _

She instantly realizes that because of what she just did to Wyoming, because they just figured out their unit, because it’s clear that South will easily win this fight now, that the next words out of that shitty fucking AI’s non existent mouth will be ‘match over’. 

She points her hand Maine-ward and thinks _ boom _ to drown out her voice, to preserve plausible deniability. She’ll be fucked if she’ll let anyone take her inevitable win away from her now. She wants this. She  _ deserves _ this. 

Maine, ridiculous tank of a human being that he is, barely stumbles backwards at having a fucking explosion set off practically in his face. South is going to hospitalize him for that. 

She stands up and advances on him, closes the distance he had created.  _ Boom.  _ Another few steps back for him. Another few steps forward for her.  _ Boom.  _ There’s just enough time between the explosions for her to hear the crackle of the speakers and she pretends not to notice it, makes the explosions happen faster.  _ Boom.  _

A yellow shield materializes around Maine, and her next explosion washes harmlessly over it. She feels her face twist into a scowl. 

“South--”

She doesn’t have to listen to him. If she can hear him, that means she’s going to hear the AI telling her to stop any second now.  _ Boom. _ Useless, blocked by that fucking shield. Is this why they picked her brother? 

Carolina pounces on her. A target that isn’t hiding behind a shield.  _ Good. _

They tumble together across the floor, and South thinks  _ boom. _

_ <But the explosion will be so close to you--> _

_ Boom.  _

_ <Well, your funeral I guess! I recommend lilies, and a white headstone.> _

Fire washes over the both of them, licks and scorches across their armor, and it’s so hot it  _ hurts,  _ but Carolina makes a sound of pain and it’s all worth it. 

South gets on top of her and slams her down. Reaches back to give her a spectacular punch, but Carolina fucking catches it. 

Perfect. 

_ Boom.  _

The explosion is pitifully small this time, but Carolina still screams. South can’t help doing so as well, so it’s not as satisfying as it could have been. They both just experienced an explosion practically in the palms of their hands, after all. A very small and pathetic and  _ tiny _ explosion though--

_ <Hey! If I’d made it any bigger I would’ve done permanent damage to your hand, missy!> _

Ugh, fine. 

“Agent--” the speakers say, and South rushes to drown her out, to reach out and think--

Yellow incases her. Her fingers scrabble over the hexagons, Carolina _ just _ out of her grasp. 

“Agent South--”

She has to make an explosion _ now  _ if she wants to make this fight continue. She turns around and sees-- 

North. Of course. 

Just North. 

Just the two of them, stuck in his dumb fucking bubble. 

Only one target. 

“--please stop--”

Time is running out. 

“South,” North pants. “That’s enough.” 

That familiar sibling hatred overwhelms her for a moment, silences her, stills her. For a moment, she’s sure she can bring herself to do it. She’s so close to victory she can taste it. 

Donut feels anxious, stressed, uncomfortable. 

She let’s her hands stay at her sides, her mind remain blank. She let’s the second pass. 

“--fighting. The match is over. You have won.” 

At the edge of her vision, Carolina rises to her feet. South is still on her knees. 

A hollow victory. 

North’s shoulders slump. Relief floods from Donut like a wellspring. 

She has that, at least. 

It doesn’t feel like enough.


	5. Focus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> South and Florida get along with their AI like houses on fire, which isn’t quite how he’d like to get along with his AI, but he’d prefer that to what York got, which was strapped down to a bed and put under observation for nearly a week.
> 
> Hopefully something like that won’t happen to Wash.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: mention of animal death and a shitty family situation

Wash is far from the first Freelancer to get an AI, but he’s still unspeakably nervous. He tries his best to hide it, but he thinks from the way he fumbles all of his sentences like he’s talking to a girl he likes that he’s pretty transparent at the moment. 

South and Florida get along with their AI like houses on fire, which isn’t quite how he’d like to get along with his AI, but he’d prefer that to what York got, which was strapped down to a bed and put under observation for nearly a week. 

Hopefully something like that won’t happen to Wash. 

He sits stiffly down in the dentist like chair in the operating theatre they’ve been doing all of the transplants in, and then tries not to freak out when they tie his wrists to the arm rests. 

“Um!?” he calmly asks. 

“Just a measure we’ve decided to implement after Agent York’s… lapse,” a tech explains, checking his circulation after he ties Wash’s left arm down firmly. 

York had punched some techs, right. Pretty ineffectively considering that the worst any of them came off with was a black eye, but still. He doesn’t remember hearing about this from South, though. 

“Did South have to go through this?” Wash asks. 

“Maybe she should’ve,” a tech mutters darkly, and he decides to stop asking questions that are clearly just pissing people off. 

Soon, he’s restrained and something is pressing up against the back of his neck. 

“One,” the tech says. “Two.” 

They inject the AI on two. 

One second, Wash is tense and nervous. The other, he’s  _ devastated.  _

When he was a kid, he had this cat. He wasn’t supposed to have a cat. Couldn’t afford it. Waste of money. But it had been so small and hungry and alone and it had  _ purred _ when he’d scratched it behind the ear and he’d fallen in love instantly. He managed to hide it inside of his closet for almost two whole months, sneaking it bits of his own meals, until he came home one day from school to find that his dad had found it. He had killed it, left it where he found it, and left the closet doors wide open for Wash to see once he got home. A lesson. 

It’s the closest he can come to how he feels now, but it isn’t quite there. Maybe if his dad had made him  _ watch.  _

“Agent Washington.”

“Good thing we tied him down after all.” 

“Agent. Washington.”

Wash blinks the tears out of his eyes and makes a confused noise around the taste of blood in his mouth. 

“How do you feel?” the tech asks, a tone to her voice telling him that this is far from the first time she’s asked that question. 

“Uh,” he says numbly. “Sad?” 

That was the largest understatement ever. Of all time. 

“Can you feel it?”

What else could possibly be the sudden source of this unimaginably huge amount of despair? 

“Gimme a moment,” he says anyways, closes his eyes, and tries to focus. 

He does his best to give the lump of horrified sadness inside of his head a mental poke. 

_ <What!?> _ is what he gets in reply. Progress? 

“Hi?” he tries. “You… okay?” 

_ <Yes,> _ he immediately lies.  _ <Yeah. Duh. Obviously.> _

Wash just spends a moment making disbelieving faces that his AI can hopefully notice. 

_ <I’m fine!> _ he insists.  _ <There’s nothing to be not fine about! Let’s just-- let’s just…> _

And then Wash gets to experience the sensation of someone rapidly going through his most immediate memories. He shudders uncontrollably in the chair, tugs helplessly on his restraints. 

_ <Let’s spar some of your friends. Yeah. Yeah, that sounds fun. We’re gonna kick their asses!> _

He blinks dizzily up at the ceiling as he feels his AI practically push the despair away and force himself to focus on half hearted, faked excitement instead. 

_ <Fake it til you make it, pal,> _ his AI says. 

“Uh,” Wash says. “Yeah, he’s definitely there.” 

There are more questions, but Wash can barely answer them with Tucker rushing him through the whole process. 

_ <Come on! Let’s get out there and work up a sweat! Best way to stop thinking.> _

“How would you know?” he asks. “You’re code, you don’t sweat.” 

He can feel his AI _ ( <Tucker, the name’s Tucker>) _ gearing up for a snarky response to that, but then the Director and the Counselor walk into the room. 

It’s like there’s an electric ripple of dread that washes through his body as his eyes land on them, starting from deep within his brain. It’s a very, very disorienting, upsetting feeling, like the tactile version of hearing nails on chalkboard. Like all of his nerve endings are unpleasantly tingling. 

“Perhaps questions can wait until Agent Washington can pay attention to them,” the Director says, and Wash winces at the reproval in his voice. “Hopefully you will be able to focus more on the practical testing.” 

“Yes sir!” he says, a little breathlessly. Had he been holding his breath? 

They finally untie him, something inside of him relaxing at the freedom of movement, and he stands up. He realizes that Tucker had relaxed along with him. 

_ <Bondage is not my thing, apparently,> _ he says, and Wash would have flushed at that if walking past the Counselor didn’t leave him feeling so pale and shaky. 

He’d ask why Tucker seems to be so creeped out by them when he’s never met them before (when they pulled Wash out of the fire and he _ owes _ them), but he really doesn’t like the idea of doing that in front of the Counselor and Director. He is, in fact, capable of tact. He’s handed his armor and he suits up. 

_ <What’s _ this _ sexy piece of machinery? > _ Tucker enquiries, his awareness bleeding into Wash’s armor (carefully turned away from the two men and their guards following them, just don’t think about them, there’s nothing to freak out about). 

“My armor,” he answers without thinking, and then grimaces a little. He just talked out loud to apparently no one in front of his boss-- but of course, the Director should know better than anyone that he’s not just talking to himself. It just feels weird, is all. 

_ Just imagine you’re talking to someone on comms, _ he tells himself. 

_ <Not the armor in general, genius, what’s  _ this-->

The world blurs around the edges, and Wash’s foot shoots out weirdly on his next step. He stumbles, staggering into the wall, just barely not falling flat on his face. 

There’s a muttering behind him, and he turns around to see three guns and the Director’s keen green eyes fixed on him appraisingly, the Counselor whispering into his ear and looking interested. 

“Uh, sorry,” Wash says, face flushing. “Just a little dizzy, I guess.” 

He waits until the Director gestures for the guns to go down, and then cautiously gets back up. 

“Watch it,” he whispers quietly to Tucker. 

_ <I didn’t know it would do that!> _ he protests. _ <And that _ they’d _ react like that. You just tripped. This place is full of assholes! > _

“They’re just a little on edge,” Wash says, feeling obligated to defend them. “An implantation could theoretically go pretty badly. There has been violent incidents before.” 

The one violent incidence being York having a flailing panic attack, but he feels like his point still stands. There’s nothing wrong with being cautious. It’s not like they actually shot him. 

He arrives at the door to the sparring room, and the Director and his cohort split off from him to the observation deck. Tucker relaxes inside of his mind, relieved. 

“The Director really isn’t that bad,” he says now that they’re alone. “So long as you follow orders.” 

_ <Yeah, well, he’s got a nasty resting bitch face,> _ Tucker grumps. 

Wash chokes on a snort and thanks god that no one but him will ever hear that particular remark. 

“Point,” he says, mouth twitching upwards in a wry smile. 

Wash enters the room and starts doing warm up exercises. 

_ <Laaame,> _ Tucker declares, and Wash rolls his eyes. As if he doesn’t get enough of that from South. 

Speaking of South, there she is, stalking into the room, and he swallows nervously. South has never been the best at holding back during sparring,  _ and _ she has explosions now. Everyone knows. It’s not exactly a subtle, quiet unit, and she’s so proud of it he’s half surprised that she hasn’t charged communications to announce it over the PA. 

And then North, yet another Freelancer with an AI and a badass unit enters the room. Wash hadn’t even been able to touch him during their sparring match after he’d gotten his unit going. No one had. 

Carolina then prowls into the room like she isn't still covered in first and second degree burns from her fight with South. 

_ <Talk about a lineup of babes,> _ Tucker comments, completely failing to grasp the gravity of the situation. 

Florida enters the room. 

“Fuck,” Wash breathes. Is Florida even supposed to be out of the infirmary so soon? He walks smoothly like there’s nothing wrong with him, but that means nothing now. Pain doesn’t touch him if he doesn’t want for it to. Which means that even if Florida is still messed up, he can mess Wash up right back. And he’ll actually have to feel it. “Tucker, you have to figure that unit out, pronto.” 

He must feel how seriously Wash is taking this fight (North with his shield unit,  _ two _ people with units who don’t bother holding back, and Carolina who doesn’t need a unit and isn’t much better on a bad day, he’s so outclassed), because Tucker doesn’t stop to whine before he gets to work. 

“Hey, Wash,” North calls out, and Wash grimaces at how he’s pitching his voice to sound as calming as possible. He knows that Wash is fucked too. “How’s the AI?” 

“Fine,” he replies. Normally he’d elaborate a bit, but… he’s kinda nervous. 

_ <Damn right I’m fine,> _ Tucker shoots off almost automatically.  _ <Fine as hell.> _

“Focus,” he hisses, tense. 

_ <I _ am,> he responds, and Wash bites his tongue because he knows that replying will just distract him worse. 

“I’d love to chat with him!” Donut says, popping into visibility above South’s shoulder. She’s standing off to the side, far away from the rest of her team. As far as he can tell, she’s on the outs will all of them, even if she never got along particularly well with Florida or Carolina before. 

“Later, Donut,” she says, arms crossed. Donut shimmers out of sight without a protest. Not any ones that the rest of the room can hear, anyways. 

“Normal sparring rules are in effect,” FILLS announces. “As is the usual warning: South, do not seriously harm your teammates.” 

South flips off the ceiling. 

“The fight starts on three,” FILLS goes on, unbothered. “One.” 

He gets himself into a ready position. 

“Two.” 

His heart is beating far too quickly. 

“Three.” 

They all start sprinting for him, and Wash knows that Carolina’s going to reach him first, she’s the fastest--

There’s an explosion, and he quickly shuts his eyes closed at the burst of flame, sunspots dancing in his vision. His ears are ringing. The explosion came from the other side of the room, didn’t even graze him. South isn’t allowed to use explosions big enough to seriously damage the ship. He squints his eyes open, trying to get his bearings back as fast as possible. There’s North, his shield falling away from where it had covered him. Carolina, getting back to her feet, having been thrown by the explosion, apparently. Florida, still running towards him--is he laughing?--apparently not affected despite the soot he can see on the edges of the left side of his armor. 

Where the hell is South? 

For a moment, he thinks that she’s actually left the room for some reason. There’s nowhere here to hide and he can’t see--

She lands onto him from above, propelled into the air by her explosion. It’s like being smacked by a cannonball. He’s suddenly dazed and lying on the floor, South on top of him, grabbing at his wrists and slamming them down. 

_ <Okay, hot yet kinda scary at the same time,> _ Tucker says and this is  _ so not the time. <Focusing!> _

She’s shoving one of her hands into his face now, palm flat and only inches away from him, her other hand still holding onto his wrists. A glimmer of pink at the edges of his vision that’s tunnel focusing on that hand. 

“You wanna safeword out?” Donut asks. 

“Wha?” he says intelligently. 

“Surrender,” South says with flat impatience. 

Wash isn’t a sore loser, but. It happened so  _ quickly.  _

“South,” North says. “Don’t--”

“I’ve _ got _ this!” she snaps. 

_ <I think  _ I _ might be a sore loser. > _

The world goes strange again, like in the hallway when they’d freaked out the guards. He struggles against South’s hold on him and-- she’s so  _ slow,  _ she’s so slow to react, she should know how to stop him from doing this, it’s so basic. But he manages it anyways. He gets his hands free and South on the floor and he stands up so quickly he goes sprawling back onto the floor on his front this time. 

The world clears back up and he can suddenly hear South shouting, “--ou  _ distracted _ me!” 

He stumbles back onto his feet, a little dizzy, and looks around. Everyone is unfortunately close to him. Florida reaches for him and Wash cries out, “Tucker!” without even thinking about it and then Florida’s movements slow to a crawl. He moves out of the way of his swipe, misjudges his steps somehow, and almost stumbles headfirst into North. 

Time snaps back into proper order. 

“That’s interesting!” Florida exclaims goodnaturedly, and then immediately lunges for him again. 

“Eep!” escapes him, because he knows that if Florida gets him in a decent hold he won’t be getting out, what with most countermoves consisting of getting the opponent to hurt enough that they let go. 

Tucker slows the world down for him again without being asked. _ <Alright, I think I’m getting the hang of this!> _

Wash evades Florida, carefully minding his steps, when he suddenly glimpses Carolina out of the corner of his eye, her hand so close to him, moving almost at normal speed even in this slow-as-molasses world. He hurriedly dives away before she can catch him, and lands flat on his face again. “I don’t think I am,” he groans. 

The world goes normal again. 

“Did he just say something?” North asks perplexed. 

_ “Catch him!” _ Carolina shouts. “Before he uses his unit ag--”

The world goes weird. 

_ <I think you’re gonna have to, dude,> _ Tucker says.  _ <I’m pretty sure the only way we’ll be able to win this fight is to drag this game of tag out long enough that the audience gets bored. Get up and running!> _

“Oh my god,” he says. “This is the worst unit ever. Of all time.” 

Well. It’s at least better than Florida’s. 

He gets running. 


	6. Neat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carolina is prepared for her AI implantation, and even if turns out that she isn’t, she’ll handle it.
> 
> Her AI isn’t scared or angry, when they first meet. He isn’t like any of the others, in that way. And in many other ways.

Carolina is prepared for her AI implantation, and even if turns out that she isn’t, she’ll handle it. 

Her AI isn’t scared or angry, when they first meet. He isn’t like any of the others, in that way. And in many other ways. 

A foreign feeling of vague confusion is her first hint that the AI is there. (She would soon grow to be very familiar with this specific sensation.)

_ <Hello?> _ he calls out.  _ <What?> _

“Hello,” Carolina replies, ignoring the second question. Too vague. 

_ <... Neat.> _

“What’s your name?” she asks. So far, she’s kind of pleasantly surprised by her AI’s behavior. No panicking, just some disorientation. Maybe she got a really good one. 

_ <Choo choo,> _ he says, and she blinks.  _ <Wait, no. Car door. No!  _ Caboose.  _ Yes, I am Caboose.> _ He radiates satisfaction at having recalled his own name. 

“... Are you sure about that?” she asks doubtfully. Caboose doesn’t really sound like a name either. 

_ <Yes,> _ he says firmly.  _ <... No. Maybe? Agh, I don’t know!> _

And just like that, he’s switched over to frustrated confusion, before it swiftly slips away like the tide, forgotten. 

“I’m Agent Carolina,” she says, not knowing what else to say. This AI’s rapidly making her feel as confused as he is. 

_ <Hello, Agent Carolina,> _ he politely recites.  _ <It is nice to meet you. Where am I?> _

“You’re on the Mother of Invention,” she tells him, starting to settle down now that he’s making sense again. Those were all reasonable things to say. He’s just a little disoriented from the implantation, is all. She’s glad it seems that she’s gotten a polite AI, instead of, for example, the sex obsessed mess that is Tucker. 

_ <Stupid Tucker,> _ he says immediately. She blinks, not quite sure what-- 

“Agent Carolina?” a technician asks her. “Are you well?” 

“Yes,” she answers promptly, and from there commences a long string of questions that she answers diligently. 

Or at least, she tries to. 

_ <Who’s that?> _

Just some technician--

_ <Who’s  _ that?>

_ Also _ just some technician--

_ <How is her hair doing that?> _ he says in a wondering awed voice, and Carolina looks at a technician with a beehive haircut with disbelief. 

“Agent Carolina?” a technician prompts her for the sixth time, and she grits her teeth and answers the actually important question she’d been asked. 

He’s just new to the world. He’s just curious. He knows literally nothing, this makes sense-- except, none of the other AIs are like this. Simmons does not interrupt York mid conversation to make him explain a haircut to him. Grif accepts that he isn’t going to know absolutely everyone on the ship and lets North go about his business. 

_ <... What is that?> _ Caboose asks, and Carolina twitches and then resolves to ignore him until the questioning is over. 

_ <What is that machine? What does it do? How does it work? What is it made of? Where did it come from? Can I take it apart? Can I make friends with it? Can--> _

“Caboose!” she snaps. “The machine isn’t important, be quiet and stop distracting me.” 

The technicians trade looks in the room, and she tenses, embarrassed. She can handle this. It looks like she can’t handle this but she _ can. _

“Yes sir,” a technician says, hand at her ear, and then she’s gesturing at two other people and they’re picking up a machine and carrying it away. The one Caboose had been so interested in. The one that had implanted the AI into her, she realizes. It looks like an incredibly strange and unwieldy large alien gun. 

Caboose radiates a deep, abiding fascination with it, and she can’t tear her eyes away from it, like that machine is the center of gravity in this room. And then it leaves the room, the doors closing, and it slips out of Caboose’s head entirely, attention already wandering in some other direction. She blinks, disoriented. That was… weird. 

Caboose gasps.  _ <Scalpels! Can I play with them?> _

She takes a deep breath through her nose and releases it through her mouth. Calm. She can handle this. Even if there’s obviously something  _ wrong _ with her AI--

“Enough,” the Director says, and her eyes snap open and dart over to him. He’d entered the room when she’d been distracted. 

Embarrassing. 

“Put on your armor and get yourself in the training room,” he tells her with a dissatisfied look. He always looks dissatisfied, of course, but it feels worse when she knows he has a right to look that way. A technician moves to unstrap her. 

_ <He seems grumpy,> _ Caboose whispers, like someone besides her could actually hear him.  _ <We should hug him!> _

Good god, no. She has to bite back a shudder at even imagining what that would be like. 

_ <Awww. Can we hug the man behind him?> _ Caboose asks. 

She looks. The Counselor. Another resounding hell no. Honestly, she’s not a huggy person in general. 

“Yes sir,” she says, one long awkward moment too late. Fuck, she’d let the AI distract her again. Jaw set, she determines not to let it happen again and she gets up to go and put her armor on. 

The Director and the Counselor move on without waiting for her. 

She jams her helmet on, the last piece, and she walks towards where the training room is with quick, long strides. Caboose asks her if he can play with a fire extinguisher they see on the wall along the way, who seven people she’s never talked to before are, if they’re on the moon even though she’s already told him that they’re on the MOI, and what her favorite color is. 

She gives all of those questions the attention they deserve, and ignores him. He doesn’t take the hint and keeps rambling. 

By the time she shoves the training room doors open, she is  _ ready _ to kick some ass. The days of being beaten by Florida,  _ South, _ of chasing Wash around a room like a headless chicken and being unable to catch him because they’ve got a fucking AI unit and she doesn’t are  _ over.  _

_ <Can we hug _ them?>

Her eyes land on York, and her gut reaction  _ isn’t _ a resounding no. She’s still too relieved at seeing him up on his two feet without an anxious frown on his face. He gives her a handsome smile, a wink, and puts his helmet on. 

_ <YES!> _ Caboose cheers. 

“No,” she mutters to him. “That was  _ not _ a yes, okay--”

“Knock knock!” Wyoming calls out, and she suppresses a groan. 

_ <Answer the door!> _

She sighs. “Who’s there?” 

“A knock down!” he happily replies. 

Wyoming is terrible at pre fight banter. And jokes in general. 

_ <I don’t get it.> _

The other two Freelancer’s she’s going to fight, Connie and North, nod and wave at her respectively. She wonders if she has a unit that’ll be able to work around North’s shield. She knows she’ll be able to work around York’s unit, he’d figured it out on his own time while he’d been stuck on forced sick leave with nothing better to do and had immediately told her like that was a thing that was at all smart or reasonable to do--

“Normal sparring rules are in effect,” FILLS speaks up. 

_ <Who’s that?> _ Caboose asks, apparently his immediate response to meeting someone new if they didn’t set off his ‘can we hug them’ reflex first.  _ <She sounds so pretty!> _

She sounds like a phone tree operator bot. 

“The fight will start in one.” 

“Caboose, you have to figure out how my unit works, okay?” 

_ <Your what?> _

Wait, fuck. 

“Two.” 

“My unit, Caboose, the thing in my armor that’s special! The one you’re supposed to operate for me!” 

_ <Ummmmmmmm.> _

Shit shit shit shit--

“Three.” 

_ She is not going to lose again.  _

She storms them. York reaches her first, because he’s fast, because he knows not to hold back when he’s fighting her because he knows she’d kill him for it and that he needs every possible advantage anyways. She punches him in the face. His visor  _ shatters, _ parts of his helmet collapsing and breaking, pieces flying. 

Connie swears and freezes in her tracks before she reaches her, Wyoming recoils several steps, Grif shimmers into visible existence by North. Carolina stares. 

“Fuck,” York breathes, hand coming up to his partially exposed face. _ “Fuck.”  _

Panic’s starting to creep into his voice, and it’s crawling up Carolina’s throat too, like bile. There’s broken glass sticking out of his remaining functioning eye, blood and fluid dripping down his face. She can’t breathe, suddenly. Caboose is finally quiet. 

“York, are you okay?” North asks. 

“Simmons, help,” York says. 

“How did you do that?” Wyoming asks her. 

How did she punch through a fucking helmet in one go. Not on her own. She could never do that on her own. 

“I thought you didn’t know how to activate the unit,” she says. 

_ <The what?> _ Caboose asks, now sounding scared in addition to confused. 

“That  _ strength,” _ she hisses. 

_ <Isn’t everyone that strong?> _

All of the other Freelancers got AIs that already instinctively know how the world works. And she got this  _ broken  _ buggy obstacle. 

“It’s okay,” York says, but he sounds shaky. Blind. What if she blinded him. “It’s going to be okay.” 

Is he talking to Simmons? Simmons, the unit. York has a healing unit. It’s going to be okay. It has to be okay. 

“Match over,” FILLS says, and doesn’t declare a winner. 

She looks up at the observation deck, tries to read the Director’s expression. She can’t, from this distance. 

She’d promised herself she’d handle this, and she’s never broken a promise to herself yet. It isn't going to happen. 

_ <Is he okay?> _ Caboose asks, as if he isn’t obviously not.  

She grinds her teeth, clenches her fists. Reaffirms her resolve. She’s not going to ask for another AI, a better one. She can work around this burden. She’s going to succeed despite everything and anything and everyone. 

She ignores him. 


	7. stealth mission

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two of the chattiest AIs in the program, a cheerfully violent probably-sociopath, and an angry woman currently obsessed with explosions all jump out of the plane and into the water for their mission that would hinge on their talent for subtlety, sneaking, and being quiet in general.

Donut doesn’t want a chilly silence. Sarge doesn’t want a chilly silence. Florida doesn’t want a chilly silence. 479er doesn’t want a chilly silence. Every single person on this ship doesn’t want a chilly silence, isn’t accustomed to them, prefers to fill the air with words and mostly friendly smalltalk. 

Every single person except for South. She’s trying her damndest to make up for being so poorly outnumbered. 

_ <Why are we supposed to hate them now again?> _ he asks her. 

Rude, chilly silence. 

_ <They sent us such a lovely fruit basket!> _

He thinks he can hear her teeth grinding now. She had burned it, he recalls. Such a pity; he’d have loved to piggyback on her senses for those strawberries. Or those cherries. Or those apples. Lots of red fruits, now that he thinks about it. 

Sarge pops up, his projection bright red, and Donut realizes the likely cause of that. 

“It’s more frigid than the Cold War up in here,” he says, which Donut knows is a mistake, because the single fastest way to make an awkward situation even more awkward is to  _ acknowledge _ it. You’re just supposed to cheerfully power through it! 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Sarge!” he chirps, making his own appearance. “Environmental suit controls are functioning a-okay for us over here!” 

“Oh, no, I didn’t mean it like that, Donut--”

“Are yours not working properly?” 

“No, they are--”

“That’s such a pity! You should have R&D take a look at it, or--” a fact that he’s never learned, something he’s just casually absorbed from South’s mind without even noticing, “North! He’s good at tinkering with the armor suits, he doesn’t like bothering people with the minor stuff that he can fix himself.” 

The chilly silence goes even chillier as Donut slowly realizes his mistake. Ah, right. The twins, they aren’t, uh, they aren’t getting along  _ perfectly _ at the moment, which is just temporary, he’s sure--

South smacks the side of her helmet like it’s a television on the fritz, like that’s where Donut’s actually situated at all, and says, “Stop that.” 

He stops that, pleased that he managed to get any words out of her at all. And she didn’t mean it in a mean way anyways, even if it undoubtedly  _ sounded _ rude. He can feel her intentions. 

For a moment, the silence continues, except it’s much less chilly now. 

“I haven’t seen much of North lately,” Florida notes, idly crushing both the silence and the not blatantly hostile aura of the ship with his voice. It’s a nice voice, but South doesn’t seem to be much of a fan. 

“He’s always visiting that blind friend of his in the infirmary,” Sarge grunts. 

He feels a prickly thought flicker through the deep darkness of South’s mind, barely acknowledged, an insecure  _ is he just doing it to avoid me?  _ Even though  _ she’s _ avoiding  _ him. _ It’s so silly. 

“York isn’t blind!” Donut protests.  _ “I’ve _ heard that he’s going to perfectly fine.” 

“You also heard that Connie and the Director have been making out,” South mutters. 

“It’s not my fault someone saw fit to spread such a juicy lie like that,” he huffs. “And anyways, I think it’s more like Grif is visiting Simmons! Ooh, what if  _ they’re _ making out?” 

“You’re the one who’s spreading the lies,” South says, and the reluctant fondness is only perceptible inside of her mind. 

_ “How would AIs even make out?” _ 479er chimes in over the speakers with something that sounds like morbid fascination.  _ “Would they… hack each other?”  _

“Don’t be vulgar!” Donut gasps, scandalized, even though what she just said is actually just nonsense. 

_ “Okay, so pinkie just opened up a the AI-sex rabbit hole for me, thanks for that, but it’s time for you guys to exit. And remember--” _ the ramp of the plane lowers, revealing the roaring wind and the dark scenery of the ocean at night rushing past them, surprisingly close by,  _ “this is a stealth mission.”  _

Two of the chattiest AIs in the program, a cheerfully violent probably-sociopath, and an angry woman currently obsessed with explosions all jump out of the plane and into the water for their mission that would hinge on their talent for subtlety, sneaking, and being quiet in general. 

  
  


“A  _ stealth mission?” _ South repeats with incredulous derision, as if the Director had just slid a dead rat to her across the table instead of the pre-briefing mission dossier. 

“Yes,” the Director says. 

“Fun!” Florida says, flipping through his own copy of the file. “Is there going to be an assassination at the end?” 

“No,” the Director says. 

“Oh god, please don’t tell me it’s a--” South groans. 

“Ohhh, it’s a recon mission,” Florida interrupts her. Donut can feel her grind her teeth at that. He wants to reprimand her, protecting your smile is important, but--  

The Counselor is standing behind the Director, off to the side, silently watching them. Donut wants to be quiet, even inside of South’s head. Silent and unseen. 

He can tell that he’s annoying South even worse with the inexplicable unease that he can’t shake off, and she’s already pretty ticked off over the entire situation in general. 

_ “Why _ is Florida being sent on this mission with me?”  she demands. 

“While I expect all of you to be able to stand on your own, you should also be able to work together well enough when I tell you to that you don’t outright sabotage the objective instead of achieve it,” the Director says coolly. 

There is a brief moment of silence, left deliberately open for denials, excuses, or disagreements. Nothing fills it, besides the quiet grinding of South’s teeth. The Director nods once, test passed. The Counselor makes a note on his tablet. Donut does his best impression of being just a dead, offline bundle of wires and circuits, nonalive and uninteresting. Florida chuckles for no noticeable reason. 

“Why,” South breaks the silence, “are we going on a _ stealth _ mission?”

It is indeed definitely not her specialty. South views stealth with disdain. After all, so long as she’s strong enough to fight her way through any enemy, what does being noticed matter? And that’s without taking her unit into account. 

“Agent South Dakota,” the Counselor chimes in smoothly, and Donut is so quiet and so hidden and so still. 

(This is ridiculous. He’s-- he might be a perfectly nice man. Donut likes nice men. He never assumes the worst of people, usually. But he just feels so...) 

South turns towards him slightly and grunts grumpily, a  _ spit it out already _ noise. 

“Are you implying that you’re afraid that you won’t do well on this mission?” the Counselor asks. He smiles. “That’s perfectly al--”

“I’m in,” she snaps, snatches the dossier up, and storms out of the room. 

  
  


Some hours after that meeting, after some smalltalk on a ship, Florida and South walk out of the sea onto the shore in full body armor, in the dark of the night. 

“This is so exciting!” Donut says, bouncing a little on his holographic toes to help demonstrate it. “Oh, should we all have secret spy code names?” 

“Do you think my parents christened me South Dakota,” South says. 

“Cutesy gimmick twin names are always in!” he defends himself. “And anyways, people  _ always _ call you South, even when you’re just eating Mac and Cheese.” 

“That’s because my goddamned _ life _ is classified, twinkles,” she says. 

“Speaking of which,” Florida says, “you should maybe go back into hiding, Donut. You stand out.” 

Donut abruptly remembers that he shines like a lightish red flashlight in the dark, just begging to be used as a bullseye to get the Freelancers sniped. “Sorry!” he says, and turns off the external projection of himself. 

He feels a spike of irritation from South, but he can’t even tell at who or what it’s directed at at this point. It could be anything, honestly. 

“Let’s just get this over with,” she says, and starts the long walk to the building they have to sneak into to get what they need. 

For lack of anything better to do, he does what he’s actually supposed to do and surveils their surroundings for enemies or dangers as they walk. Lots of foliage. He has to mess with some code to properly see the fetching colors of it all in the dark without startling or distracting South. 

_ <At least the scenery is pretty,> _ he says. 

She crushes some flowers underneath her boot as she walks. He feels like she maybe could have easily avoided that. 

For a moment, he wants to huff ‘well, be that way!’ Except she’s South. She would just be that way. She would continue to be that way. She would never stop being that way if he let her. He shrugs off the urge to be dramatic and focuses on staying positive instead. 

He’s  _ very _ good at staying positive. 

_ <The company’s nice too!> _ he says, because he genuinely thinks so, and also half to lure South out of her sullen silence. 

“The company’s psychotic,” she hisses, and he’s willing to count her low volume as a promising token attempt at tact, nevermind that they’re on a stealth mission. 

_ <Sarge and Florida aren’t that bad,> _ he insists, cheered at her responding to him at all. She  _ is _ pretty easy to goad, admittedly. 

“Spines don’t work that way, Sarge,” Florida chuckles behind them, presumably responding to his own half heard conversation. Logically speaking, it should be less disturbing to them than it would be to most other people, as they know for a fact that Florida isn’t just crazy and are even going through the same thing themselves (that thing being having another person inside of their head). “Trust me, I know.” 

If it only weren’t for the  _ kind _ of conversations they had that they could only catch snatches of. 

South, after a moment of radiating pure dislike for Florida, neatly switches mental tracks to radiate pure smugness at Donut, of the ‘I told you so’ variety. Donut doesn’t appreciate it. 

_ <That doesn’t prove anything,> _ he tries. _ <They could be talking about anything! I frequently wonder how far our teammates could possibly bend, you know.> _

“Blerg,” South says, not even bothering to inject any proper disgust into the word. 

Donut thinks about Wash bending, very hard. 

“BLERG,” South says with much more heat this time.  _ “Stop that.”  _

“Stealth mission,” Florida reminds her in a sing song. Donut can feel her metaphorical hackles rise. 

_ <Not a fan of Wash?> _ he asks in a gambit to distract her from starting an argument with a man who would cheerfully refuse to argue back. 

It works. She wrinkles her nose up. “Not like  _ that. _ He’s so…” She struggles for words, and as she does so he feels the general gist of what she’s trying to describe. Hundreds of tiny moments flicker through her mind, snapshots only seconds long, showing Wash messing up and shrugging his shoulders instead of stewing over it, or letting himself be the butt of a joke or happily play along with being the goofball, of accepting not being taken seriously and not really seeming to mind it. From South’s point of view, her emotions coloring the memories, Wash almost seems like nothing more but an easygoing jokester, lazy and ambitionless. 

This isn’t really the impression of Wash that Donut himself has gotten. He’d tell her to go easy on him, except that South doesn’t go easy on anyone. She’s very hard. He’d love to help her get some relief and relax. 

“Goofy,” she finally settles on. Donut doesn’t bother arguing with her. 

_ <Mmm, so you’re more into the strong silent type,> _ he says knowingly. 

She rolls her eyes. “Shut up,” she says, but there’s no sting in it. “You caught me checking out Maine’s ass  _ once.”  _

He’s almost got her in what counts as a good mood for her, he happily notes. And that’s with Florida at her back and the two of them trudging through nature in the middle of the night instead of sleeping to go and fulfill what South would describe as ‘the most boring ass kind of mission in the galaxy’. He’s a miracle worker. 

“Ah, I think that’s it,” Florida notes. 

They pause and look. Sure enough, a few hundred meters away, there it is. A dark building, it’s silhouette just barely made out in the darkness, and past it Donut thinks he can see more buildings. The edge of a remote town. 

“What we want is inside of that building,” he goes on. 

“I know,” South says. 

“On the third floor in commanding officer’s office, if we’re lucky.” 

_ “I know,” _ she repeats herself. 

“Now, it’s the middle of the night and they don’t seem to think that there’s any special reason to worry, so we’ll only have to work around a sparse night shift of guards and patrols--”

“I read the dossier too, Florida,” she snaps. 

“Really?” he asks, and Donut can feel anger boiling up inside of South’s brain like steam at his genuinely surprised tone. “I didn’t know that.” 

“Well, you don’t know everything,” she says, and stalks off ahead. 

“I thought you just let your brother give you the summary,” he says, following after. 

Donut realizes that what Florida is saying is right. He can feel the memories bubbling up in her mind, dozens of moments of tossing the dossier away and waiting for North to give up and fill her in on all of the really essential stuff.  _ Everyone else can memorize the unimportant shit.  _

But South isn’t talking to North, isn’t letting him talk to her, so she stubbornly read the dossier herself from front to back. 

There’s a very, very brief moment of longing. And then a roiling wave of anger appears to cover it up. Anger directed at North for making her mad at him, at herself for missing him, at Donut for catching the moment of longing, at Florida for bringing it all up. Him being right certainly doesn’t help matters. 

Almost-good mood lost, just like that. Donut wants to sigh. 

“I can read on my own,” she hisses, and then recklessly storms off ahead towards the building. 

“Oh dear,” Florida says. “Do you think I hurt her feelings?” 

South is two seconds away from turning around and having a fistfight with Florida in the middle of enemy territory, Donut realizes. 

_ <Oh, look!> _ he says brightly.  _ <A hole we can squeeze into!> _

“What?” South asks, taken entirely off guard. 

“Oh, I wasn’t talking to you,” Florida says. 

“And I wasn’t talking to _ you,” _ South says. “Donut, speak English.” 

He highlights what he’s talking about on her HUD.  _ <I don’t see what the confusion is, I was being perfectly clear.> _

“A vent grate,” she realizes. “We could sneak in through there without being noticed, probably.” 

Florida walks up next to her. Or rather, he appears next to her. They didn’t hear him approach, and Donut is impressed by his cats feet. South bristles silently. 

“Hm,” Florida says. “Do you think we’d fit?” 

They all look at the far off vent for a moment. It’s a bit hard to judge from so far away, but it really does look like a tight squeeze. Florida and South both have broad shoulders and more than enough muscle. 

“Maybe if we take off the armor?” South suggests. 

_ <Maybe with some lube?> _ Donut suggests. 

“Maybe…” Florida says thoughtfully. A moment of silence. “I’ll fit,” he says decisively. He walks forward. After a moment, so does South. 

“I don’t think you will,” she says after they’ve approached the vent grate, eyeing it doubtfully. Donut hates to be a downer, but he has to agree. There’s no way that tiny little thing will let Florida’s big handsome broad shoulders pass. Or South’s, for that matter. 

“At least let me try!” Florida says, and kicks the grate in with a dull clang. 

“Fine,” she says. “I guess it’ll be fun to watch you try and fit, like a dad who’s outgrown his highschool jeans and refuses--” 

Florida casually hooks the elbow of his left arm around the elbow of his right arm, his left arm held vertical, his right horizontal. Like he’s stretching out for a fistfight to make sure he doesn’t pull something in the doing, except then he keeps on stretching and  _ stretching,  _ his left hand grabbing onto his right shoulder, his arms going tighter and tighter, until something  _ wrenches-- _

South is interrupted mid sentence by a sort of… wet sound. Florida lets go of his arm. It hangs limply, several inches lower than it used to. 

“Care to do my other arm for me?” Florida asks. 

South gapes. 

“That’s alright, I can do it myself.” Florida slightly bends and locks his knees, bracing himself, and then drives his left shoulder into the wall of the building  _ hard.  _ When he sways away from the wall there’s a small new shoulder pauldron shaped crater in it, and both of his arms are as unmoving and limp as a corpses.  _ “Now _ I’m sure I’ll fit.” 

Florida gets on his knees and wriggles into the vent, his arms flopping along with him. 

“... I just passed up dislocating Florida’s arm,” South croaks in realization eventually. 

Donut wonders if there’s some sort of AI version of puking, because he feels like it’d be fitting right now. 

“Wait,” she says, and crouches down next to the vent. “Florida!” she hisses into it. “What the fuck am I supposed to do!?” 

_ “Hmmm,”  _ Florida replies from within the vent, his voice echoing eerily.  _ “You could stand watch for the exit while I retrieve the objective?”  _

“Oh  _ hell _ no,” she says. “Don’t try and sideline me! Do I look like some fucking grunt to you? I’m not gonna stand watch, I’m gonna _ win  _ this piece of shit mission!” 

_ <I thought you didn’t want to do this mission,> _ Donut says. 

“I don’t, but I’m gonna and I’m gonna do it amazingly.” 

_ “Pop out your shoulders and follow me then,” _ Florida’s voice says pleasantly.  _ “You’ll catch up to me, right? You read the dossier. You know where the office is.”  _

Her breath catches with anger as she opens her mouth to say a retort that turns up blank. She really will have to dislocate her shoulders if she wants to use this entrance. 

_ <Well I’m afraid explosions won’t help you with _ that,> Donut says. 

“Florida,” South says. “Get back out here and we’ll find an entrance both of us can use, you asshole.” 

No answer. He’s too far away to hear her. 

“Don’t ignore me, fucker!” 

Or that, if you’re a cynic. Still no answer. South swears quietly to herself. 

_ <What now?> _ Donut asks. 

South slowly hooks her left elbow around her right elbow. 

_ <Oh no no no NO NOPE NOT THAT NU UH,> _ Donut says. 

“Stop shouting,” she says, and pulls, harsh and quick. Pain blooms in her shoulder, a slight noise is torn out from between her gritted teeth, and her shoulder stubbornly doesn’t dislocate. She’ll bruise later, probably. 

_ <Soooooouuuth,> _ he says. 

“Stop--” another harsh, painful tug, “--distracting--” pulling, harder and harder, a viciously repressed whine building at the back of her throat, “me!” She lets her grip go slack with a gasp. And then she starts pulling again. 

_ <Stop tugging on it, it’s sensitive!> _ he cries. 

“He’s obviously  _ challenging _ me,” she says. “He thinks that I can’t do it, he thinks that he can just leave me here like I don’t matter and can’t help while he does the whole mission himself. I can do it. I  _ will _ do it. I’ll fucking show him, he’ll be so--”

Her shoulder is really,  _ really _ starting to hurt, pain starting to drown out the coherency of her thoughts. 

<He cheated!> Donut shouts, like an epiphany.  _ <He  _ cheated, _ South, he didn’t even do what you’re trying to! You feel pain and he doesn’t. It’s not the same thing at all! He’s playing on easy mode and you’re stuck being hard. > _

South stops pulling. Turns his words over in her mind. 

“... You’re right,” she says, a rare occurrence. 

_ <Yeah,> _ Donut says with relief. _ <Yes.> _

“He was probably  _ baiting _ me to do that,” she goes on. 

_ <Um,> _ Donut says. 

“That son of a bitch! He tricked me, tried to get me to  _ dislocate my fucking arms.  _ Sick fucking psychopath--”

_ <Volume. Stealth mission.> _

South snarls at being essentially told to be quiet, and at the fact that he’s right to do so. At least she snarls quietly. 

And then she walks away from the vent. 

_ <Where are we going?> _

“To find an entrance that we can actually fit through.” 

Well. South obviously isn’t going to just watch the vent for Florida’s return, and Donut would very much rather if she didn’t dislocate her arms, so. He supposes this is what they’re doing now. 

She walks around a corner and sees four guards clustered around a door. She freezes for a moment, and then takes a slow step back to behind the corner. 

_ <... Do you think they saw us?> _ Donut asks. 

“Judging from the fact that they aren’t shooting or shouting at us,” South says, “I’m guessing no.” 

She walks in the opposite direction, and this time peeks around the corner more cautiously. She darts back at the sight of two guards about a dozen feet away. 

“Do you think I could kill them without making too much noise?” 

That  _ really _ isn’t South’s specialty. 

_ <We’re not supposed to leave any trace of us even being here,> _ he points out. 

“Oh, like they won’t guess when the USB stick goes missing. What, is the boss here gonna assume that he forgot it in his jeans pocket before he threw it into the washing machine?” 

_ <I feel like they’re supposed to not be able to guess that it was  _ us _ that did it. Also to give us a headstart with using the information maybe? > _

“So it just has to be not obvious what was taken or done, or who did it,” she decides. 

_ <I… guess?> _

South turns around towards the wall, grabs a pipe, and starts hefting herself up. 

“Does a broken window scream PFL to you?” 

_ <Well now that our lockbreaker’s blind...> _

South smiles slightly as she climbs. “I’ve heard somewhere that he’s going to be perfectly fine.”

_ <Well _ I’ve _ heard that he’s blind as a bat! > _

“Oh, I don’t know, Donut. My source is pretty legit.” 

_ <Your source doesn’t know what he’s talking about,> _ he huffs. 

“Wow,” she says. “I never would’ve guessed.” 

She reaches a third story window and wiggles it. It doesn’t budge. She sighs and punches it. Broken glass falls to the ground below. It’s stealthy by South’s standards, he supposes. 

There are raised voices of alarm, approaching footsteps. South hurriedly pulls herself through the window, breaking more glass along the way. 

_ <We’re like ghosts,> _ Donut says.  _ <Apparitions. They’ll never know we were here!> _

“Someone’s broken a window!” the faint voice of a guard outside says. Flashlights light up the broken window. South flattens herself to the floor and crawls down the hallway. 

“They’ll never know  _ we _ were here, at least.” 

_ <I think this is it!> _

She opens a door and walks inside to the sight of Florida lying on the floor strangling a man in a suit to death with his legs, his arms still lying limp and useless. She stares. Then she closes the door behind her and heads for the desk. Rips out a desk drawer and upends its contents on the desk, rifles through it. No USB stick. 

“Help,” the man gurgles faintly, clawing at Florida’s armored leg. 

“South,” Florida says warmly. “What a surprise to see you here!” 

South roughly swipes everything on the desk onto the floor, rips out another drawer and upends that onto the desk as well. Starts searching. “I said I’d come too, didn’t I?” 

“Please,” the man wheezes, his face turning some pretty interesting colors. 

“So you found another entrance?” 

“Yup,” she says, popping the p. “A better one.” 

“How nice,” Florida says. “Was it subtle?” 

“Yes,” she says. 

And alarm starts ringing throughout the building. 

“Before you say anything,” she says,  _ “you’re _ the one who started killing people first. Murdering some guy definitely doesn’t count as ‘leaving no trace’.” 

“I was going to stuff him into the vent,” he says. 

“Ugh, that would’ve  _ reeked.” _ She scrunches up her nose. 

“Sure, but it would’ve taken them a while to figure out what and where it was!” 

“Also,” she says, and victoriously holds up the USB stick, _ “I’m  _ the one who found the objective first, so I technically win this mission.” 

“Oh, are we not doing this by highest kill count?” Florida asks sweetly. 

_ <I think he’s dead now,> _ Donut says.  _ <I think he’s been dead for a  _ while,  _ actually.> _

Florida finally unwinds his python like legs from around the dead man’s neck, and he slowly stands up without the use of his arms. “Care to pop these bad boys back in for me?” 

Donut can feel her considering, thinking about making Florida run the rest of the mission without arms. 

(“While I expect all of you to be able to stand on your own, you should also be able to work together well enough when I tell you to that you don’t outright sabotage the objective instead of achieve it,” the Director says coolly.) 

_ <You  _ did _ miss your chance to dislocate one, > _ he points out.  _ <Maybe setting them will be fun?> _

“Fine,” she says with a roll of her eyes. “I’ll do one for you, since you’re so helpless.” 

Florida chuckles. South grabs his right arm, positions it, and shoves harshly There is no hiss of pain from Florida, no tensing. It pops back into place neatly, with another disgusting sound. 

Donut ignores South’s disappointment and focuses on the approaching footsteps instead. Looks at the ransacked desk, the dead man on the floor. 

“I think they’ll be able to guess what was taken pretty quickly,” he says, popping into being over South’s shoulder. 

“We could steal a bunch of other thingamajigs before we go!” Sarge suggest brightly, following suit. Florida wrenches his left arm into place. 

“Hi, Sarge!” Donut says. Sarge waves at him. 

The office door is slammed open by a guard. South shoots him without hesitation. 

“If we  _ are  _ going by highest kill count,” she says, “then we’re tied for that.” 

“I don’t think we’ve got the time to take a bunch of other stuff,” Florida says thoughtfully. “But I can think of another way to make sure that no one sees us or figures out what was taken.” 

 

Florida makes a suggestion for once in his life that South actually reluctantly _ loves, _ and she explodes as much of the building as she can. The building crumbles, people scream and die, fire spreads, and technically, they leave no trace of them behind in the smouldering ash heap. Florida oohs and ahhs like he’s watching a fireworks display and she tries not to preen. 

South has the objective. South killed the most people. She  _ won _ this stealth mission. 

_ <Forced shutdown imminent,> _ Donut says. That explosion took every drop of power the armor had. It’s unpleasant, but-- he’s happy that South’s happy. He hopes the fact that the armor’s going to be so heavy to lift without any power in it to assist that Florida’s probably going to have to carry her won’t ruin that good mood again. 

Ah, who is he kidding. She’s definitely going to be in a mood.

"Good work, Donut," she says, and he goes under. 


	8. pretty stupid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carolina is sad. She misses her best friend. She won’t visit him for some reason. It’s pretty stupid.

Carolina is sad. She misses her best friend. She won’t visit him for some reason. It’s pretty stupid. 

She’s also been training  _ all day _ and it’s _ so boring, _ which is also stupid. 

“Can we go get lunch now?” he asks her. “Oh, but only if it’s not gross!” 

She punches through him and lights up one of the many, many small floating, rotating hexagons. It lights up in good job green. 

“Ow,” he says, except after a moment of waiting he realizes that it hadn’t hurt. 

\--because it wasn’t his real body she hit it was just light and color his real body is connected into her port on the back of her neck chips and wires and faint humming electricity touching and going into her brain meats and he wishes  _ so much _ for hands of his own so he can take it out and take it apart and try and figure out how it works and see if he can put it back together again or change it make it do something different--

“Stop that,” Carolina says. She isn’t twisting and twirling and kicking and punching any longer, the shapes circling around her in patterns he keeps losing track of undisturbed. She’s standing still, hands clenched. 

“Stop what?” he asks. 

_ “Obsessing _ about machines,” she says. “I can barely think when you do that. You’re… taking up too much bandwidth in my brain.” 

“Should I end the training session, Agent Carolina?” Sheila asks. She’s so nice. Caboose likes her a lot. She talks to him while Carolina trains, which makes it less boring. Except for when Carolina tells them to be quiet and let her focus. Caboose usually just ignores that because she says it  _ all of the time, _ but Sheila always listens to people, which is nice except for when people tell her to be quiet. Carolina told Sheila to be quiet and let her focus hours ago. Ages. Forever. 

He feels restless and antsy, wants to crawl out of his own skin-- Carolina’s skin-- his port. Caboose wants to  _ move, _ except Carolina’s already doing plenty of moving. A different kind of moving. Something that’s fun instead of work. He thinks he wants for her to climb something instead. And to shout while she’s doing it. She’s so quiet while she trains and fights, doesn’t even grunt. Clenches her teeth and her jaw and focuses on moving perfectly. Soooo boring. 

A brief mental image flashes through Carolina’s mind. Her best friend’s face, except it’s when he’s got glass and blood and fear on it. Caboose immediately tries to get away from it, unhappy. He’s, he feels-- it wasn’t his fault! He didn’t do that, he didn’t mean to do that. 

“No,” Carolina says, cold in her voice and her head and the pit of her stomach. The shapes keep moving and Carolina attacks them. 

Caboose makes his fake lights color projections body fall away, wants to hide as he makes himself ask for this. 

_ <Can we go and see York?> _

Carolina punches through the next shape like it’s a brick wall, like it requires more than just a light tap of her fist. She ignores him. 

If they go and see York, maybe they’ll find out that he’s better now. That it wasn’t so bad. That he isn’t mad at Caboose or Carolina. That it’s okay, everything’s okay. 

Maybe Carolina will finally stop making Caboose look at York’s bloody face over and over again, every single day, at random moments like the  _ worst _ kind of hiccup. 

Carolina is ignoring him and Sheila isn’t allowed to talk to him right now and Carolina’s doing the same boring old thing again and York’s face is still lingering at the edges of her thoughts were Caboose can see him too if he isn’t careful. He tries to hide in his chips and wires and electricity, in Carolina’s brain meats. 

_ She wonders if she can just accost North in a hallway to find out York’s situation without visiting him in person. The thought makes her grimace instinctively, a sour taste in her mouth. The idea smacks of cowardly avoidance to her,  _ cheating. _ Like getting the answer to a problem by peeking at the person sitting next to you instead of doing the hard work and finding out the answer on your own. _

_ <Dizzy,> _ Caboose thinks.  _ <Dizzy!> _

Carolina stops moving again, grinds her teeth for a moment before consciously lodging her tongue between her teeth to stop herself. “How. Are you dizzy. I swear to god, if I got an AI with motion sickness I  _ will  _ take you to R&D.” 

_ <That was weird,> _ Caboose groans.  _ <Can we go and see York now?> _

Carolina pauses, doesn’t immediately say no. Caboose cheers up. 

“There’s no reason for me to go and see him,” she says. “It won’t make him better, it won’t fix anything, I won’t be able to do anything, I’ll just be disturbing his recovery--” 

Caboose recognizes that small scared feeling as  _ he’ll be mad at me.  _

“But you’re best friends!” he says, popping back into being, close to her face. She takes a step back, but his light self just follows her without having to move. “He’ll be so happy to see you!” 

“I hurt him,” she says tensely. “Friends don’t do that. And who said that we’re best friends? This isn’t middle school, Caboose.” 

“Friends accidentally hurt each other all of the time and it is totally normal and fine okay,” he says in a rush. “And  _ duh, _ of course you’re friends. You are super worried about him!” 

Carolina shifts uncomfortably, opens her mouth and closes it. Blood is rushing to her face, he feels. 

“You are being dumb,” he declares. 

_ “I’m _ being dumb--!?” 

“If we go and visit him you will see that he’s fine and you will stop worrying and he will be happy because his best friend came to visit him! It is really so simple, Carolina.” He can’t believe it isn’t as obvious to her as it is to him. 

“And what if he’s not fine, Caboose? Huh?” she says, crossing her arms and leaning closer to his light self. “What then?” 

“He’s fine,” he says firmly. 

“You have no reason to believe that,” she says. 

“Yeah, well!” he says. Fumbles for a response for a bit, before an idea plops into his head. “Neither do you!” 

He makes his light self give himself a pat on the back for that one. That was good. Really smart. 

“... I don’t have a reason to believe that he’s fine?  _ Yeah,  _ Caboose, that’s my point.” She huffs and starts hitting targets again. 

“What-- no! That is, that’s not what I meant,” he splutters. 

“I believe,” Sheila cuts in smoothly, “that he meant that your belief that Agent York is not well is just as unfounded as Caboose’s belief that he is. You cannot know anything for certain until you confirm it with your own eyes.” 

“Aw, thank you, Sheila,” Caboose says. 

“It’s FILLS,” she corrects him. 

Carolina doesn’t say anything until she’s turned all of the targets green again. She wipes her brow, runs her fingers through her hair, tightens her ponytail. 

“... Fine,” she says. 

“HOORAY!” Caboose cheers, and explodes into every shade of blue he’s ever seen, and makes the sparkles that rain down Carolina aqua as thanks. 

Carolina blinks rapidly, sunspots in her eyes. “... Don’t do that again.” 


	9. hard work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And then, heartbeat not slowing down, she realizes that York had noticed her first even though she hadn’t made a noise. A smile breaks out over her face, Caboose is yelling incoherently with glee in the back of her head and for the first time it isn’t annoying, and she takes a step into the room.
> 
> “Yes,” she says. “It’s me.”

Carolina silently lurks in the doorway of the infirmary, like an indecisive nervous little girl, like a sniper lying in wait for the perfect opportunity. She feels pathetic and monstrous in equal measure, which she feels isn’t particularly fair or reasonable. Why does she have to feel both? Shouldn't it be just one or the other? 

Speaking up would probably dispel these feelings. But if she just stands here quietly and doesn’t announce her presence for long enough then York will notice her on his own and call out to her, and then everything will be fine anyways because he was able to see her. Or he won’t notice her at all, in which case she’ll have her answer without him having to know that she was ever here in the first place. 

He’s lying on a bed in full armor, the bed propped up a bit in the way hospital beds can be, and she can’t see his face because of his helmet (must be a new one), so he could plausibly be awake. So he could notice her at any moment. Or he could plausibly be asleep, which could be why he hasn’t noticed her yet. 

God, she’s losing herself to some sort of Schrodinger’s spiral of whether or not York is blind. Just rip the bandaid off. Just get it over with. Just grit your teeth and make yourself do it, and don’t stop or slow down until it’s over and you’ve won--

“Carolina?” York says, and Carolina does a full body flinch, like she just touched a live wire, electricity running through her and leaving her spine even straighter than it had been before when it leaves her, shoulders up high, breathless with how unexpected his voice had been. Like jumping out of your skin, except her feet hadn’t left the ground. 

And then, heartbeat not slowing down, she realizes that York had noticed her first even though she hadn’t made a noise. A smile breaks out over her face, Caboose is yelling incoherently with glee in the back of her head and for the first time it isn’t annoying, and she takes a step into the room. 

“Yes,” she says. “It’s me.” 

“I was wondering if you’d visit,” he says, but there’s no jab or double meaning to the words. Just his curling smile, audible in his voice.  _ Pleased _ to see  _ her. _ Pleased to  _ see _ her. She had been wrong on every count, Caboose had been right about everything. It’s a deeply wrong state of affairs, pure dumb luck on his part, so unfair that someone so smart and strong and hardworking as her should ever be wrong about anything but, but, but. Giddiness is rising inside of her chest. She was  _ wrong.  _

_ <Told you so!> _ Caboose says cheerfully, and she doesn’t even mind. She doesn’t even mind! Incredible. 

“Well, I had to come and see how you were doing,” she says, as if she’d been planning on doing so all along. What matters is the end result: she did the right thing. It doesn’t matter if she was initially considering doing the wrong thing, so long as she ultimately succeeds. People have a lot of clever sounding things to say about the journey, but in the end it is the destination that is the goal. The journey is a side effect, an obstacle. No one would suffer it if they didn’t have to. “And… to apologize.” 

Apologizing is rough, and hard, and unpleasant. People avoid it desperately, like hard work or pain. Which means that she of course never shies away from it. 

“Carolina--” he says. 

“Let me say it, York,” she says, firm and reasonable. 

He nods at her. 

“I’m sorry I hurt you so badly, York.” She doesn’t say that it was an accident. It was, but that smacks of making excuses, which is a quality she hates in herself and others. She shouldn’t have let it happen anyways. The fact that it was an accident doesn’t make York any less injured. It doesn’t make her any less guilty. “I’m not going to let it happen again,” she says, and it’s a promise to him and to  _ her, _ and she’s never broken a promise to herself. Never ever. 

“Good to know,” he says, and it’s not the most serious response but there’s a warm smile in his voice instead of a droll tone, so she knows it isn’t a joke. He’s taking her seriously. He believes her. 

She abruptly, intensely wants to kiss him. 

_ <Ewww,> _ Caboose says. 

Carolina makes the conscious decision not to consider how she’s going to have a romantic and sexual relationship with someone with a childish idiot inside of her head (or with York having a panicky idiot in his, for that matter) right at this moment. For now, she’s still flooded with relief at York being okay and she wants to bask in it. Deep thoughts and hard decisions and negative feelings and difficult solutions can wait a day or two. 

“You better get used to it,” she mutters in aside to him. And then, to York, “Take your helmet off.” 

York has never minded her bossing him around, which is yet another mark in his favor. She’s tallied all of his points, and he makes second place on her list as well as the leaderboard, which is exceptional considering that she’s around to snag first place and all. 

“I can’t,” he says, which is rare of him to say to her. She blinks. “The healing unit works better if I’m wearing full armor.” 

“The healing unit,” she says. “You’ve still got that thing on?” 

Well, he is still in the infirmary. She had just thought-- hadn’t he said he wasn’t really supposed to use it for minor injuries? Which means he still has major injuries. But, he’d  _ seen _ her--

“For my eye,” he says. “Simmons says he thinks he can do something, but he needs to focus--” 

“You saw me come in,” she says, and she’s so caught off guard she forgets to keep it from sounding accusatory. “You _ saw  _ me.” 

“Simmons saw you,” he corrects her. “You know that shitty recording camera in the helmet, he’s hooked up into that and he let me know when he noticed you. It’s just a little workaround until he fixes--” 

Simmons is a nervous bundle of wires that got York strapped to a bed and punted down two slots on the leaderboard until he got well enough to regain his place through impressive shows of skill in sparring matches, more obstacle than help for York just like Caboose is to her (just like reckless Sarge is to Florida, encouraging him to use his body as a wrecking ball at every opportunity; just like Donut is to South, driving her up the wall with his cheerful chirping as if she isn’t mindlessly angry enough as it is, giving her the ability to make a big loud mistake at her fingertips at any moment of every day as if she even remotely has the impulse control for that kind of responsibility). As if he’s going to be able to fix York’s blindness? As if he isn’t just panicking, spiraling, making false promises and throwing himself at a wall trying to find a solution that isn’t there? Why should she trust him? When has he proven himself to her? Blind. York is  _ blind  _ and Carolina did it and York is going to have to be led around by an AI like an anxious high tech seeing eye dog for the rest of his career, his life, until the Project (the Director) decides to take even that away from him and put Simmons with someone newer, someone less damaged, better allocation of precious resources. What happens to retired Freelancers? She’s never met one. Been here since the start of the program, first to volunteer. Never seen what happened to a Freelancer who wasn’t killed in the line of duty who decided to quit. It’s never happened before. Is it even allowed? So many secrets, and you just get to leave? 

York is shaking her arm. Not hard, but his voice is noticeably worried. “Carolina? You okay?” 

Is  _ she _ okay. She is standing here, without even a broken finger from her armor shattering punch, being forgiven without hesitation by York who is blind but doesn’t think it will last. She can’t bring herself to believe it for a moment. 

_ <Um,> _ Caboose says, his voice sounding queasy and small.  _ <Your thoughts are very fast and very loud and very many, right now. Could you pretty please stop?> _

“I should go,” she says, by which she means  _ I shouldn’t be here.  _

She’d been right and Caboose had been wrong. That did make more sense. 

_ <You are not stopping,> _ he whines. 

“Oh,” York says, disappointed. Disappointed that she’s leaving. She wants to laugh, and something else. A large feeling in her chest that she decides means more training. “--Wait!” 

She waits. He deserves that. 

York doesn’t say anything else, hand still held out vaguely in her direction, and she realizes. 

“... I’m here,” she tells him. 

“I just had a question,” he says. 

“Yes?” she says instead of giving him an expectant look. 

“Does Caboose ever…?” 

_ Caboose.  _ Really, he wants to talk about  _ AIs? _ Carolina is already growing sick of them. So quickly, she knows. 

Caboose perks up at the sound of his name, and she wonders how she knows, what that feeling is, how to describe it. The tactile version of wiggling your mouse so your screen lights up, deep inside of her brain. 

“... does he ever,” York rallies, unusually hesitant. “Okay, so I know this is going to sound a bit strange, so please don’t spread it around?” 

“Of course,” she says. If there’s anyone whose secret she can keep. 

“Does he ever get real scared of the Counselor?” York asks. “Does he ever-- does he ever seem to  _ remember _ something? Something bad?” 

“No,” she says without hesitation. Caboose wants to  _ hug _ the Counselor, and he doesn’t remember anything that’s inconvenient for him, and half of the things that aren’t. “Not at all.” 

“Oh,” York says, like that wasn’t the answer he’d wanted to hear. 

“Simmons strikes me as an easily intimidated AI,” she tries to mollify him. “Someone whose mind will invent vague bad memories out of dreams and anxieties for them to fret over.” 

Someone who shouldn’t be on the battlefield, in other words. The kind of person Carolina usually doesn’t have to suffer. Civilian material, if only he weren’t nothing more than a particularly advanced experimental computer program made to support violence. 

“--right, yeah. It’s just-- never mind. It’s just us, then. Means it isn’t anything important. We’ll handle it.” 

“Okay,” she says, and half believes him. York, she trusts. Simmons, not at all. AIs aren’t reliable, after all. 

She leaves, hard work done, answers learned. 


	10. how Florida joins

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back when he went by Flowers (Butch to his friends, he’d always tell them, but they always nervously insisted that they follow army protocol), he fought aliens, just like the majority of the UNSC.

This is how Florida joins Project Freelancer: 

 

Back when he went by Flowers (Butch to his friends, he’d always tell them, but they always nervously insisted that they follow army protocol), he fought aliens, just like the majority of the UNSC. 

It had been interesting. Different from fighting other humans. There had been a learning curve, finding out by trial and error how to best break them, where they were most vulnerable. Where to shoot, to stab, to punch. Different joints, different weak spots. He learned faster than the rest of his squad put together. He’s always been a quick learner, especially when he’s interested in the subject matter. 

He’d cut off a body part from one of the corpses (or soon to be corpses) after every fight. Head, arm, leg, something new every time. 

“Just as a souvenir,” he’d tell his squadmates, to mixed reactions. 

“Weirdo,” Kane would huff under her breath. 

“Just don’t let it stink up the barracks, Flowers,” Gordy would say. 

“Dude, that’s way too big,” Yang would say, and would then go and find themself a much more manageable sized trophy, like a mandible or a claw, and they’d hold it up as an example to him. 

He’d smile and take home his large unwieldy souvenir anyways. Because they weren’t souvenirs, not really. He’d have stopped after the first skull, if that was the case. He brought back body part after body part, and he’d inspect them. He’d take his axe and see at what angle he’d have to swing it to make the joints come apart easier. He’d bring down his knife over and over again to see if any part of the skull caved in faster than others. It was research material. 

And some he would admittedly preserve, keeping shiny oddly shaped skulls and bones and fangs wrapped inside old t shirts.  _ Some _ souvenirs, keepsakes from what he then considered to be some of the best days of his life. They were pretty. Maybe he could make decorations out of them, after the war. With some paint and polish and filing, he could turn them into all sorts of things. It was fun to think about, to prepare for. Just another hobby. Flowers liked to keep busy. 

Something else that had been interesting was how those in charge dehumanized the aliens to the troops. (Well, they weren’t human. Depersonized?) Of course, dehumanizing the enemy was a longstanding tradition in human warfare. People preferred to not kill people they liked. People they felt sorry for. People that they empathized with. 

Flowers has never quite  _ gotten it, _ has never really minded fighting or hurting people he likes. He likes most people, after all. He’s a friendly guy. And he likes violence. There has never been any conflict within him when it comes to these two facts about himself. He likes people, and he likes violence. So what? Hurting people doesn’t stop them from being people. He can still enjoy them. 

But while he might not quite get it, he understands the concept of it. People don’t want to kill people that they like, that they even think they might like. So the enemy gets dehumanized. Natural, explainable, predictable. 

But what’s interesting is  _ how  _ the Sangheili get dehumanized. It’s different from how humans do it to other humans. When it’s done to other humans it’s all: oh, they’re so  _ different. _ Oh, they’re so brutish, so unintelligent, so sly, so lazy, so cunning, so selfish, so greedy, so cowardly, so violent. They’re  _ bad people.  _

Sangheili don’t get even that. They aren’t bad people. They aren’t people. They don’t have negative personality traits, they don’t have personalities period. They’re animals. They’re killing machines. No emotions, just instincts. Feel free to kill them without remorse, like mowing down virtual zombies in a video game. It’s fine. They’re not people. Don’t think about it. 

Flowers doesn’t believe any of that junk for a second. It’s so  _ silly. _ He has eyes, you know. He has ears. He can see the way they desperately struggle when he kills them. He can hear the horror in their strange voices when their own fall in front of their eyes. Can feel the furious determination with which they try to avenge their fallen comrades on him. 

He knows that Sangheili are people by their fear and their anger and their grief-- and it changes nothing for him. He enlisted prepared to kill people, and that’s what he’s doing. Others though, when they notice, when they see the pure hatred in their enemies eyes, they pause. They flinch, they gape. They weren’t prepared. They came in expecting monsters and animals and killing machines, and instead they just found their own reflection, people like them, killing something unfamiliar and yet not. 

And then they leave the battlefield and convince themselves they saw nothing, that it was all in their heads. They drink and they forget and they laugh, because people don’t want to kill people that they like, that they even think they might like. 

A lot of them just die there on the battlefield though, frozen by the shock and realization, at not having their expectations met. Frozen by that fear and anger and grief, killed on the spot for hesitating, for empathy.  

Flowers never hesitates, and this is why he’s still alive. He can recognize that he’s fighting people, though. He just doesn’t mind. 

 

“Flowers,” Gordy says one day in a weird tone of voice. “What the hell is that.” 

Flowers looks up at Gordy, smiling at him. He’s normally taller than Gordy, but he’s sitting on his rock right now. He likes to come out and sit on it to think, or meditate, or clean up his souvenirs. Remove the skin and flesh, that kind of thing. He has a fresh clean skull in his hands now, just polishing off the last of the blood. 

“Is it lunch time already?” he asks. 

“What the hell,” Gordy repeats himself, teeth gritted and hands clutching tightly at his rifle,  _ “is that.”  _

Flowers looks down at his hands, his new skull. 

“A souvenir,” he answers, a little puzzled. Gordy already knows about his habit, doesn’t mind it so long as he doesn’t bring the smell of rot to where they sleep. “I was thinking maybe later I could paint it with a nice swirling design, flowery. Like the tattoos she had.” 

“That’s Kane,” Gordy rasps, and Flowers isn’t sure why he’s stating the obvious like that, like it’s a stunning thing. Kane has a very distinctive head of hair, after all, ridiculously long for a soldier and a dark natural red. It’s all pooled at his feet, along with her brains and her skin and her flesh and her eyes--

“She was already dead,” he says, wondering if maybe that’s the problem, if Gordy’s remembering some of the times he’d take the things he wanted to keep from Sangheili that were still feebly fighting back. Flowers knows that it isn’t okay to kill the people on your side. “Shot by that Elite, remember? You saw.” 

“What are you doing with her,” Gordy asks, like he hasn’t walked in on this exact scene dozens of times by now. 

“She’s going to stink if I don’t clean her up first,” he points out. “You hate that.” 

“Why-- why are you-- stop acting like this is normal, Flowers,  _ what are you doing to her!?”  _

Gordy doesn’t normally get this shrill, always a cool head under pressure. Flowers makes his voice extra soothing. “I’m cleaning her, Gordy, so that she’ll make for a nice souvenir. A good decoration. Something to remember her by.” 

A long, stunned silence. And then:  _ “You can’t do that to people, Flowers!”  _

The realization washes over him like ice cold water as the pieces click together for him suddenly. From Gordy’s point of view this isn’t at all the same as him keeping body parts from the Sangheili. Aliens aren’t people. They’re killing machines, monsters, animals. No emotions, just instincts.  _ Gordy doesn’t think Sangheili are people.  _ He thinks that Flowers has been collecting trophies from felled beasts, like a hunter with a hut covered in pelts and taxidermied corpses. 

Flowers had forgotten. He’d just seen his squad be okay with him collecting people's body parts, and assumed that they’d feel the same way about all people. Except they’d never thought he’d been collecting pieces of dead people. He’d been collecting dead animals in their eyes, dead not-human, not-people things. 

Flowers has Kane’s skull in his hands, her blood on his armor, the remains of the rest of her head at his feet along with a knife, and Gordy is staring at him in horror, like he doesn’t understand the difference between animals and people. 

He opens his mouth and realizes that there’s nothing he can say to make Gordy stop looking at him like that, to make him realize that  _ he’s _ the one who’s wrong, the one who misunderstood. 

It’s not like he killed Kane. He just removed her head from her body and took it back to base. Sangheili are obviously people, just like them. It’s okay to take parts from Sangheili. It’s okay to take parts from people. It’s okay to take parts from humans. All of these conclusions are logical, orderly, and make perfect sense to him. Except that people refuse to admit that Sangheili are people because they’re too weak to kill without the lie, not like him, and he’d forgotten, hadn’t fully realized, and here he is. Absolutely screwed. 

Everyone in the army thinks like Gordy. That they’re people and the enemy isn’t. That Flowers is holding his very first stolen body part from a person in his lap. 

He closes his mouth and smiles instead, for lack of anything better to do, and turns back to continue cleaning the remaining blood off of Kane’s skull. Might as well finish what he started. 

 

Gordy reports him. Flowers gets into trouble. A man called the Counselor comes and praises his skills. Offers him an alternative, a way out. 

Flowers keeps the skull. 


	11. how York joins

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He looks at her flawless makeup, the scars going up her bare muscled arms, her silky looking red hair put up in a ponytail that looks fancy for some reason he can’t articulate, and immediately feels put on the spot. Like a surprise quiz, or a sudden unforeseen time limit, crushingly close to running out. 
> 
> _ I have to impress this woman  _ now _ before she walks away or else I’ll have lost my chance with something incredible,  _ he thinks. 

This is how York joins Project Freelancer: 

 

He wouldn’t get on top of a bar and announce into a megaphone that it was because Carolina wanted to sleep with him. He wouldn’t confess it to a journalist. He wouldn’t boldly declare it from the rooftops for all to hear. But… he’s got a feeling that it played a part. Tipped the scales a bit. Just a hunch, really. 

He meets Carolina in a nightclub when she walks up to him, a perfect stranger, and snatches his lighter out of his hand without shame or hesitation where he’d been absent mindedly fiddling with it along with an arresting green glare and a, “That is so fucking annoying.” 

He looks at her flawless makeup, the scars going up her bare muscled arms, her silky looking red hair put up in a ponytail that looks fancy for some reason he can’t articulate, and immediately feels put on the spot. Like a surprise quiz, or a sudden unforeseen time limit, crushingly close to running out. 

_ I have to impress this woman  _ now _ before she walks away or else I’ll have lost my chance with something incredible,  _ he thinks. 

“I’ve got some bad news about my entire personality, then.” 

He has always had the unfortunate tendency of all of his skills suddenly evaporating if he’s racing against a ticking clock. 

But the woman huffs a semi laugh through her nose anyways, rolls her eyes, and sits down next to him, his lighter in her hand. 

Charming, be  _ charming.  _ He sticks his hand out. “Pleasure to meet you--?” 

“Carolina,” she says, and she enunciates it slowly and clearly, deliberate in a way that instantly makes him think it isn’t her real name. That’s alright. This is a nightclub, he doesn’t need to know her real name. 

“Pretty name for a pretty woman,” he tries. 

Her eye roll this time isn’t accompanied by an amused huff of laughter. Damn. He better reel it back in. 

“I saw you arm wrestling that guy over there,” she says, and then tilts her head towards a pouty muscular man in the corner nursing a drink. 

“Oh, him? You saw that?” He preens for a moment, glad that she had, but then remembers that she seemed to like the self deprecating stuff more than the cheesy pickup lines. “To be honest, that guy’s just a walking pile of glam muscles.” 

She smiles a little. Tired of bragging men, that must be it. Well, he can be humble. He can be the  _ humblest. _ “And then he had to buy your drink for you?” 

“Contests aren’t much fun without stakes,” he says. 

“Sometimes winning can be its own reward,” she says. 

“Winning  _ and _ free drinks, though?” 

Her smile goes wider. He can’t help but smile back. 

“You raise an excellent point,” she says, and then she props her elbow up on the bar, her hand open and waiting. “I have to warn you, I’ve got expensive taste.” 

For just a moment, he blinks at her, and then he grins again, propping his own elbow back up on the bar. “Are you trying to get me drunk, Carolina?” 

She laughs at him. “You won’t be getting another drink for the rest of the night.” And then she clasps his hand, counts to three, and slams his hand down onto the bar so hard that for a moment he thinks he might’ve honestly broken something. 

“One Long Island Iced Tea, please,” she tells the bartender, casually plucking his wallet out of his pants pocket. He has to laugh at her sheer audacity, even though it comes out breathless from the surprise and the pain. 

“I want a rematch,” he says. “I was _ not _ prepared.” 

“Are they ever?” she asks. “Let me get through my drink first.” Stone cold confidence. It’s cheeky and  _ attractive as hell.  _

 

They arm wrestle four more times, have a dance off, a drinking contest, race down the street, and then do parkour on their way back to his place, which is a _ great _ idea to do when drunk. Carolina wins every single time, and he isn’t even upset. He’s never been a sore loser, and Carolina is a fantastic dancer (but an hilariously awful singer), and she can do  _ so many  _ backflips. While in  _ heels.  _

They stumble giggling up to his door, drunk off of booze and each other and winning (that one’s just Carolina, although he sure feels like a winner as well). He pats himself down, trying to find his keys. He frowns. 

“I think I-- I lost ‘em. The keys.” 

Carolina groans. “You  _ dork. _ Is, is there a window we can climb through?” 

“Hang on, I know what to do,” he slurs, dropping most of his vowels. He scrounges through his pockets, and victoriously holds up his wallet. At least he hadn’t lost that as well! He opens through it and comes back up with his credit card (now covered in Carolina’s smudged fingerprints, the minx) and slides it through the door crack, down towards the lock. 

Carolina leans against his back, her hot breath against his ear. It’s utterly distracting, but also works as an incredible motivator to get through the door faster. 

“I don’t know how to do that,” she marvels. 

“Well-- it’s, it’s not like people hold courses about it, right. Kinda, heh, not suuuuper legal.” The door clicks open, and he does a  _ ta dah _ motion. 

She stares at the door for a moment, and then stares at him. “It’s a useful skill,” she says. “Practical.” 

“Especially if you’re drunk off your ass and keep losing your fucking keys, eh?” 

“And in other circa--circumcision--circum--  _ in other situations,” _ she says, nodding wisely. 

“I guess,” he says, scratching at the side of his nose and trying not to think too hard about breaking into people's houses and taking food and showers and naps on soft beds and taking any clothes that fit him and anything he thought he could sell and even just sitting on the sofa and watching TV, pretending to be a normal kid for a bit. Pushing his luck. 

She suddenly leans into his chest, arms around his shoulders, red lips and green eyes and flushed cheeks and her pretty hair mussed from the night’s physical activities. She smells like fresh sweat and sticky sweet booze and some kind of floral perfume. Drunk off his ass, he does exactly what his hindbrain tells him to and just closes his eyes and inhales deeply like a creep, soaking in the intoxicating scent of her. 

“What’s your name?” she breathes against his lips. 

His eyes spring open as he realizes that he’s spent this entire evening with her and he’d completely forgotten to give her any kind of name at all. Ah  _ fuck,  _ he’s an idiot. 

“I’m,” he says, and then he actually brainlessly fumbles for his own damned  _ name _ for a moment. God, he really is drunk. 

She’s looking at him thoughtfully, wondering, considering. “How about York?” she says. 

“What?” he says. 

“Y’know,” she says. “I’m Carolina, you’re New York. Just York’ll do, though.” 

He laughs. “That’s where that’s from? Which one are you, North or South?” 

“Both,” she says. “I’m good enough for  _ two _ states.” 

“Of course,” he says, nodding. It makes perfect sense, really. “Whatever you’re into, North South Carolina.” 

“Remind me to talk to you about PFL, tomorrow,” she says, and then she pushes the door open and him through it. 

York forgets to reclaim his lighter, so he obviously has no choice but to follow her to her classified military operation. 


	12. a good gift

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Recent dislocations at the shoulders, knees, hips, and ribs. Florida really does love that trick, twisting around to punch at or reach an opponent in an unexpected way that shouldn’t be possible, that defies what humans joints should be capable of. They’d been put back into place, but there’s swelling, some minor tearing to a ligament in his right shoulder, and a hairline fracture in his left leg bone. They should heal alright on their own in a few weeks if there ain’t stress put on them, Sarge reckons.
> 
> Florida’s movements are as fluid as ever, smooth as a stalking panther.

Recent dislocations at the shoulders, knees, hips, and ribs. Florida really does love that trick, twisting around to punch at or reach an opponent in an unexpected way that shouldn’t be possible, that defies what humans joints should be capable of. They’d been put back into place, but there’s swelling, some minor tearing to a ligament in his right shoulder, and a hairline fracture in his left leg bone. They should heal alright on their own in a few weeks if there ain’t stress put on them, Sarge reckons. 

Florida’s movements are as fluid as ever, smooth as a stalking panther. 

_< Easy on yer left leg, soldier> _he says. It makes him feel all… _coddle-y_ to point it out, but the lack of limping isn’t _great_ for the facture. 

“No kicking doors in with the left leg, got it,” Florida replies. 

Not exactly what he’d meant, but it’d do. 

It turns out to be unnecessary for him to kick any doors down down anyways, as the infirmary ones slide open for him near soundlessly at his approach. 

“So accommodating,” Florida hums. “Hey, Yoooork!” 

  
There’s a startled yelp, and then a very loud clatter as a full grown man in armor falls out of his bed onto the floor. 

“Hi, how are you doing?” Florida says, friendly as you please, still approaching. York fumbles his way into a standing position, knees slightly bent and hands held in front of him like he’s cautiously making his way through the dark. 

“Florida!” York says, a little high pitched. “Wow! Hi! What’s up! Please stop where you are!” 

Florida stops. “Whatever for?” he asks. 

“It’s just, uh, I kind of feel like I’m in that scene in a horror movie where the power goes out and the killer’s slowly approaching with a knife, is all. It’s kinda weird not to be able to see you.” 

If York gets this jumpy every time he gets a visitor, then Grif is being mighty selfish coming over so often. Lousy Grif. 

Florida laughs. It last for an appropriate two seconds and is warm and joyful, and it sounds  _ exactly _ like his last laugh half an hour ago did, and the one he had a week ago, and the one he had two weeks ago, and the one he had the day Sarge met him. Florida, with very few exceptions, laughs the exact same way every time. 

People get more nervous the more often they interact with Florida, Sarge has noticed. 

Sarge doesn’t care. He just really likes the times Florida’s laugh gets all different, usually in the middle of a glorious battle. It’s a pretty and wild sound, instead of plastic perfect. 

“We’re both killers, York,” Florida says, like York had just cracked a particularly clever joke. 

“Right. Right.” 

Sarge activates his hologram, not that York can appreciate his handsome red armor at the moment. Florida’s admiration will just have to do. 

“How’re you doing, son?” he asks. Not because he’s  _ concerned, _ injuries happen to a soldier and it’s completely natural and nothing to be upset about. He’s just making chatter. Just checking in. Just staying on top of things. 

“Oh, Sarge,” York says, sounding flatteringly pleasantly surprised. “Well, from what I can can gather, it’s about shifting stuff around, recycling material, reconnecting nerves, returning synapses the ability to fire off correctly. Something about cones? I honestly have no idea what Simmons is constantly mumbling about inside of my head.” He laughs self deprecatingly, posture relaxing as he talks. 

“Let him report to me directly then,” he says. 

York lapses into a brief silence, murmuring quietly to himself. To Simmons. And then he speaks up. “Ah, no can do, Sarge, sorry. Simmons is _ very  _ sorry, actually, but he’s busy with work right now.” 

Sarge huffs at this, but is then a little proud of the boy. He must be up against some hell blazing odds, if he can’t even talk to Sarge for a moment. 

“Well, that’s too bad,” Florida says, voice going all ‘aw shucks’ but still with a smile audible behind the words. “And when we came to visit you as well.” 

“Ah, um, well,” York says. “I wasn’t really expecting you! You don’t tend to visit me when I’m hurt. Or anyone else, for that matter.” 

Florida stalks forward. Smooth, fluid, silent. Putting subtle, infinitesimal stress on that fracture in his leg. It’s fine. It’ll be fine, it isn’t a serious injury. 

Florida pushes his bounty into York’s chest, and York recoils and chokes on his spit in surprise. 

“For you,” Florida says. 

York takes the item pushed into his chest automatically, and gropes at it blindly, trying to figure out what it is, most likely. 

“What is it?” York asks, tone a little thready, shoulders raised. 

It’s a good gift, Sarge thinks with satisfaction. 

“Pudding cup,” Florida says, and smiles wider. “South asked me to give it to you as a get well soon present.” 

“How…….  _ nice. _ Of her.” 

“Isn’t it?” Florida asks. “Donut wanted for her to get you something, but you know how shy she is, so she was resistant to the idea.” York has a brief coughing fit at the word shy. “She seemed so pleased with herself when she came up with this. I’m happy to play messenger! Just don’t shoot me, okay?” 

“I don’t think I’ll be shooting anyone for a while, Florida,” York says. 

Sarge feels a sympathetic pang go through his circuits for the boy at that. 

“Do not surrender yet, maggot!” he barks in his most encouraging voice. “You will slaughter the enemy once again! You just have to believe in yourself, and the power of technology, and friendship, and warfare, and magic and miracles a little bit too probably!” 

“... Thank you, Sarge, I was real broken up about that.” He smiles, wry and amused. “Really, thanks a bunch.” 

“I only wish we’d gotten you a gift of our own,” Florida sighs. “If only this ship had a gift shop.” 

York chuckles. “I want a classified military project keychain.” 

Simmons flickers on. 

“Florida,” he says, all clipped tense no nonsense. “I know what you could get us as a gift.” 

“Oh?” Florida says, intrigued. 

“Simmons?” York says, surprised. 

“Get us an eyeball,” Simmons says. 

“Can do!” Florida chirps. 

“WHAT,” York says. 


	13. eyeball lava lamps

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What had York’s old eye color been again? Brown? Gray? Green? Blue? Something dull enough not to stick in Florida’s memory, anyways. Oops. He’ll just have to pick the prettiest one he can find and hope he likes it.

What had York’s old eye color been again? Brown? Gray? Green? Blue? Something dull enough not to stick in Florida’s memory, anyways. Oops. He’ll just have to pick the prettiest one he can find and hope he likes it. 

He’ll also have to pick an eye from someone who’s  _ acceptable. _ After a long,  _ long _ argument Simmons eventually brought York around to the idea, on the condition that Florida doesn’t take an eye from just anyone. Florida already knew that it isn’t okay to take an eye from just anyone, okay. He knows how laws work, how people react to violence. He has to pick the right victim. Not an ally, not a superior, not someone too important, not someone too sympathetic. 

An enemy is perfect. 

He volunteers for a mission--there are always missions--and he nabs one on his way out the door during his exit. There’s some commotion when he comes back, people in the hallways double taking, wide eyed and reaching for their comms, but he holds his head high and walks with purpose. Confidence that what you’re doing is fine is enough. So long as you aren’t caught doing anything  _ too _ drastic. But since when has harming enemies been forbidden? Florida has always been permitted to do more things here in PFL than he has anywhere else, to be his most authentic self yet. PFL is his peak, and he hopes he never has to come back down. 

No one stops him. He enters the infirmary with his gift and plunks it onto York’s lap. 

“Here you go!” he sing songs. 

“As promised!” Sarge chimes in. “We  _ deliver.”  _

“What-- what is this, Simmons--” York says, touching the gift. 

“--didn’t ask for a _ person!”  _ Simmons says, appearing mid shriek. “We need an eye! Just an eye!” 

“Oh, I know!” Florida says. “But body parts go bad so fast once they’ve been detached from the whole, so I thought this would the best delivery method. We can unwrap it right here in the infirmary!” 

“Oh my god,” York says. “Oh my fucking god, I  _ knew _ this was bad idea--” 

The gift makes a muffled groggy pained noise through their gag. 

_ “--they’re still alive!?”  _

“Body parts also go bad very fast if the whole is dead.” 

Before York or Simmons can say anything about that, guards storm into the infirmary and casual conversation becomes quite impossible over all of the ruckus. 

 

Florida’s gift gets confiscated. Apparently, bringing in live enemies isn’t allowed. Spending extended time around live enemies isn’t allowed. 

“Was he wearing a gag the entire time?” the Director asks. 

“Yes, sir,” he says pleasantly. It’s basically the truth. Sure, there’d been about a minute at the start there where that hadn’t been true, but the enemy had only used that time to scream, so so what? Screams start to blend together after a while, all sounding the same. Although Sanghellis have a certain subtle underlying chirr to them that distinguishes them from humans at least. Florida suppresses a nostalgic sigh. It’s been too long since he’s killed a Sangheili. Not since he joined PFL. 

“Don’t do this again,” the Director says. “You’re dismissed.” 

Florida obeys the man that lets him play on the battlefield without repercussion. 

 

He isn’t told what they do with the live enemy he brought in, and he isn’t curious enough to ask. Eyes can be found everywhere. It’s no big loss. 

 

“Maybe if we rip out the eyeball and then put it in a bottle of vodka…” Sarge muses. “Strong liquors basically like formaldehyde, right?” 

“I’m not sure, but I’ve certainly disinfected wounds with alcohol before,” Florida says. 

“Hey, asshole!” South hollers from across the training room. Asshole isn’t his name, but there also isn’t anyone but the two of them and their AIs here, and South wouldn’t have to speak, much less shout, for Donut to hear her. Florida waves. “You watching!?” 

“Looking good!” he shouts back to her, giving her a thumbs up. 

South turns around and explodes a training dummy. Plastic limbs fly in seperate directions. She whirls around and looks at him expectantly. 

Florida dutifully claps. Sarge whoops and hollers in enthusiastic approval. South struts in a particularly self satisfied way to the various blown up dummy parts around the room as she gathers them all up to put in a messy pile all together. 

“You know that child that insists her mother look as she does a backflip on the trampoline?” he quietly asks Sarge. 

“Possibly,” Sarge says, cagey but fond, still looking at South as she lazily tidies up. Florida hums around the amused curl to his lips. 

They consider other possibilities together as South annihilates three more dummies. Perhaps they could get one from the blackmarket? Those  _ must _ have eyes, right? Somewhere? And they  _ had _ to be ready for implantation, right? Otherwise what was the point?

“Well,” Florida says. 

“Oh ho ho no, sonny, I’ll have you know that I have it on good authority that havin’ a bunch of your fallen foes gussied up dismembered body parts strewn around the bedroom is apparently  _ not _ the norm, although it is a shame, that.” 

“It’s good interior decorating,” he defends himself. 

“Hey, yer preaching to the choir here,” Sarge says. “Drinking out of your enemy’s skull is a  _ classic.”  _

“Well I don’t do  _ that,” _ Florida protests. “I have a very nice tea set and you know it.” 

“How would you even decorate with eyeballs?” Sarge wonders. “Put em in a lava lamp?” 

“What the _ fuck _ are you guys talking about?” South asks, having apparently approached them while Florida was distracted. Sloppy of him, honestly. Just because he’s in his home and among allies doesn’t mean that he should let his guard down like that. “And why does it involve eyeball lava lamps?” 

“And why am I only hearing about this amazing tea set now!?” Donut demands, appearing. 

“South never RSVPs to my tea parties,” Florida says with a pout. 

_ “South,” _ Donut says, aghast. 

“Fuck off,” she says. “We are  _ not  _ drinking tea with the psycho.” 

“Oh, but he can watch you explode things!?” 

“I don’t have an official diagnosis, actually,” Florida says. 

“What’s your point?” South asks Donut, ignoring him. 

“So you can do things  _ you _ like with Florida and Sarge--like being applauded for gross property damage--but we can’t do stuff  _ I _ like with them?” 

“You like tea parties!” South says indignantly. 

_ “So!?” _ Donut says, echoing her tone. 

_ “I don’t like tea!”  _

_ “WHAT’S WRONG WITH TEA YOU HEATHEN?”  _

“Do you think this is actually about tea…?” Florida quietly asks Sarge. 

“This argument could go one of two ways,” Sarge says. “Either we get a highly entertaining deathmatch, or this devolves into tears and emotions.” 

“It is literally impossible for this disagreement to come to blows,” he reminds him. 

“Odds are in favor of wailing and crying then,” Sarge says grimly. “Agent Florida, I suggest a strategic retreat is in order.”

“I trust your judgement,” Florida says, and leaves without being noticed. 

 

Florida takes a bottle of vodka to his next mission, and when he returns it has something new floating inside of it. It occurs to him to stop York from drinking from it just in time. 


	14. the cold shoulder

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> South feels her shoulders go up at the laughter.

The tea argument spirals out of control. 

 

South is venturing into exciting new and unexplored territory when it comes to giving someone the cold shoulder. Cold shouldering your twin brother? Old news, overdone, easy mode. Cold shouldering an entity that _lives inside of your brain?_ _Now_ she’s taking shit to the next level. 

She had not expected for Donut to cold shoulder her right back, considering he has no shoulders and also he couldn’t shut up and stop trying to be everyone’s best friend for five seconds for the life of him. She resents him for the sudden wellspring of silence he’s found now, finally when she wants for him to constantly want her attention like always, just so that she could deny him it. He’s not supposed turn the tables on her like this. 

He’s clearly doing it just to spite her, and it makes her fume with impotent fury. She wants to shout at him, except then she’d be the one breaking the cold silence first, and then he could blatantly ignore her first, making _ her  _ the loser in the relationship. And she is not going to lose to fucking  _ Donut.  _

She decides to give herself an easy win to help her handle the surprisingly difficult cold war she’s got going on with her AI, and goes and stands in North’s general vicinity, as if it’s just a coincidence. 

“South,” he says almost immediately, cautiously, giving in for her instantly. It’s so easy it even robs her of some of the satisfaction. She scowls at the wall she’s looking at instead of him, frustrated. It’s like everything she does just makes her  _ more _ angry. 

She doesn’t say anything. After a moment, there’s a soft pink glow out of the corner of her eye. 

“Hi, North!” Donut chirps. 

South stiffens, anger sharpening like it always does. It can always go sharper. 

“Oh, hello, Donut,” North says. 

North isn’t paying attention to her any longer. Now she’s just standing around, quiet and silently paying very close attention to what’s they’re saying while they ignore her and talk to each other instead. 

“Do you want to come out and say hi too, Grif?” North says in a familiar coaxing voice, except it isn’t directed at her. 

“Oh, please!” Donut says. “I’ve never even gotten to talk to him!” Because South has been avoiding North, and therefore Grif as well, ever since she got Donut. 

He’s manifested _ just _ to make his cold shouldering more obvious, and now he’s found yet another way to rub it into her face. 

“--fine, fine, quit nagging me,” Grif says, appearing. She can already see what they intend to do. All three of them having a pleasant conversation together like she isn’t silently fuming off to the side. Mocking her. 

“Heyyyy, Grif!” Donut singsongs. “How are you! And how’s Simmons? Is it true that York has eight eyes now _ like a spider?”  _

“--what?” 

“Come on, dish the hot goss, Grif!” 

North is doing that quiet laugh thing. Not wheezy and tearfully breathless like Wash gets, but keeping it quiet so that no one thinks he’s mocking them, and shaking all the more with amusement for how much he’s concentrating on being silent. It’s so fucking noticeable, the dumbass. 

_ He’s laughing at me, _ she thinks with absolutely certainty. She  _ knows.  _

Donut stops talking mid sentence, like something had just startled him speechless. He feels unsettled. 

“You know what, no, actually, he’s got one eye now, except it’s gigantic and centered on his forehead like a cyclops.” Grif goes on. 

“I will testify under oath in a court of law that York has to now shriek and use echolocation to see,” North says, and Grif snorts. 

South feels her shoulders go up at the laughter. People are always laughing at her like she’s a  _ joke, _ like she’s missing something obvious. She knows a quick and easy way to make it stop though, a way to make the laughter abruptly stop every single time. 

It’s her brother though, so she doesn’t lunge at him. Instead she jerks into movement, violently shoving something she barely glances at to loudly clatter onto the floor, and she stomps off, wishing she could slam sliding doors closed. 

“... What’s her problem?” Grif asks as the doors slide closed, North silent, laughter gone. She’d succeeded, she’d punished them for laughing at her and put them in their places. She’s not far enough below them to be mocked. She can knock them over whenever she wants to, and she won’t stand for the slightest insult, so they better tread lightly. 

_ Everyone,  _ she thinks.  _ Everyone but me.  _

Donut is still quiet. It makes her angry. She wishes she could  _ shake _ him and shove and push and hit him until he had no choice but to acknowledge her, to stop fucking with her. But that isn’t an option. It’s makes her boil with rage, because she knows that there’s nothing she can say that will make him stop, nothing that she can say to change his mind. The most words can ever do is briefly shock people enough to show weakness. Action is what makes people bend and break. 

So talking would just be digging her grave deeper, giving him more ammo, make her look weaker, waste her time and effort. It’s hopeless and futile and she already know what works one hundred percent of the time. So long as you can win the fight, so long as you’re stronger and more willing to hurt the other person, the one willing to hurl yourself into a fight first, you won’t be laughed at. People can’t be made to like you unless you’re willing to live as a desperate people pleaser like  _ North,  _ but they can be made to fear you, easily. And that’s as good as like. 

_ <... South,> _ Donut says slowly, and she stumbles a bit in her stalking down the hall in surprise, knocked off her train of thought.  _ <I’m sorry.> _

She stares off into the hallways, surprised. And then she starts walking again, doesn’t answer, and smirks. She  _ did _ win. She knows this is something to be smug about even if she’s still too angry from what just happened to feel it. A low, deep kind of angry that makes her think of black scribbles and static and sewers, consuming and tainting her. A foul mood. 

_ <You feel like that all of the time,> _ Donut says quietly, and she doesn’t bother listening to him. She’s giving him the cold shoulder, after all. 


	15. Out of my way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carolina ignores him.

Carolina’s brain feels all messy. Caboose’s brain is all messy too, but he’s used to it. He knows where everything is, more or less, or if it’s moved while he wasn’t looking then he can find it again pretty easily. So long as he doesn’t get distracted. Carolina’s brain is a  _ new _ kind of messy. Unfamiliar. Unpredictably kind of hurts to try and touch, like picking up dropped thumbtacks from a rug, the nice soft kind that it’s fun to pet and all of the thumb tacks are invisible and hiding in it. Cutting himself on corners and sharp edges he doesn’t know to look out for. 

_ <What game are we playing?> _ he whispers in her head, because she’d told him to be quiet. Maybe because they’re playing hide and seek. He doesn’t remember hide and seek involving the hider and the seekers all shooting at each other though. 

Carolina ignores him and shoots at a man, and the bullet goes through his head and then the head of the man behind him too. 

Whatever they’re playing, Caboose feels like Carolina’s probably winning. 

_ <BINGO!> _ he cheers, because they’re on the same team so Caboose is winning too. 

Carolina flinches and mutters a naughty word underneath her breath, shoots three more people. 

_ <Are we going to get blackout,> _ he says excitedly,  _ <and do we have to paint our armor black if we do?> _

Carolina reloads. 

_ <I hope we don’t have to, because blue is my very favorite color.> _

Carolina vaults over her cover and charges for the remaining people who are still moving. They scream and run away even though there are more of them. Carolina shoots them too. 

_ <If you win Go Fish, do you get a fish?> _ he wonders. 

Carolina kicks a door down. 

_ <That’s dumb. Machine pet friends are better.> _

Carolina looks around the room for anyone’s who’s hiding. When they started the game, Carolina was the one hiding, but he guesses now that they noticed her their roles have switched. 

_ <Because, um, because if they get broken you can fix them easier. Duct tape does  _ not  _ work on meat pets.> _

Carolina finds a man hiding in a closet, and instead of shooting him just hits him very hard in the throat. 

_ <And they don’t make a mess.> _ Blood spreads in a puddle on the floor where the man lands.  _ <Except for oil sometimes. Or sparks. Which can turn into fire. Which turn into ash, which is very hard to wash off of your hands even if you use soap.> _

“Location cleared,” Carolina says. 

Caboose is so surprised and happy that he feels like he _ glows,  _ floats, and he accidentally activates the little jetpack boosters on the back of Carolina’s armor that’s supposed to help her move if there’s no gravity or if she needs to run extra super fast. She stumbles, her hand coming up to support herself on the wall. Her hand goes right through the wall and she stumbles some more against it. She makes a frustrated growl-snarl noise. 

_ “Roger that,”  _ someone says over her comm, and Caboose realizes that she wasn’t talking to him after all. 

He feels dim and heavy, disappointed. Like being promised cookies and then not being given them after all. 

She wrenches her hand out of the wall, and then looks down at her gun. While falling, she’d squeezed it with her hand and now it doesn’t look like a gun any longer. It looks like a weird pointy ball of metal with finger shaped indents. Like squishing clay in your hand. 

“Caboose,” she says lowly. Cautious, he waits for someone else to speak up first to see if she’s really talking to him this time. And then he realizes that that’s his name. 

_ <Carolina! Hi!!> _

“Get out of my armor,” she says, “and just stay inside of my neck implant.  _ Out of my way.” _

Caboose doesn’t know what to say. Or how to think about that in a way that doesn’t hurt. So instead he takes his code and he pulls it slowly and carefully out of the armor, like maybe Carolina will change her mind if he gives her enough time and he radiates enough sad while doing it. 

Carolina doesn’t say anything. He hates that. He hates it when she does that. She does it a lot. 

And now Caboose is all rolled up tight and gathered in her neck implant instead of spread around everywhere he can reach, and. He hates that too. It’s like trying not to move or fidget. It’s easy to just be in the brain when the brain is all there is, but now there’s more and it’s moving and doing stuff and Caboose isn’t allowed to hear or feel it. 

Carolina wins whatever the game is. She doesn’t invite Caboose to play. 


	16. sexual jumper cables

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _ <Where fucking is it.> _
> 
> “Tucker,” Wash groans. _ “Please. _ I’m trying to sleep.” 
> 
> _ <It has to be here somewhere!> _
> 
> Wash grimaces at the feeling of someone rummaging through his brain with electricity. It doesn’t hurt exactly, but it’s  _ weird _ and definitely not conducive to falling asleep. 
> 
> “Tucker I don’t know what to tell you,” he sighs. “If you can’t find it then it’s just not there, I guess.” 
> 
> _ <How? How does that work!?> _

_ <Where fucking is it.> _

“Tucker,” Wash groans. _ “Please. _ I’m trying to sleep.” 

_ <It has to be here somewhere!> _

Wash grimaces at the feeling of someone rummaging through his brain with electricity. It doesn’t hurt exactly, but it’s  _ weird _ and definitely not conducive to falling asleep. 

“Tucker I don’t know what to tell you,” he sighs. “If you can’t find it then it’s just not there, I guess.” 

_ <How? How does that work!?> _

He rolls over onto his side and squints into the darkness of his room. The glowing numbers of his alarm clock tells him that it’s three in the morning. He sleepily wants to murder something. Or scream into his pillow. But then he’d _ really  _ wake up, and he’s not entirely ready to give up hope yet. 

“Not everyone has as large a libido as everyone else.” 

_ <You have to have  _ some _ libido though! If I can just find it and attach some-- sexual jumper cables-- > _

“You’re not making any sex, Tucker.” He pulls the covers over his head like this will in any way muffle Tucker’s voice. “I mean sense.” 

<You’re  _ not making any sex.  _ Or  _ sense,> _ Tucker grumbles. _ <Maybe it’s behind your cerebellum?> _

“Okay, I’m getting up,” Wash decides. 

_ <You are!?> _ Incredulous hope. 

Wash pulls his covers away and stands up. 

_ <Oh. You mean like that.> _ Disappointment. 

“Please stop thinking about my penis.” 

Wash spends ten minutes hunting through his room for armor pieces and putting them on in the dark, repeatedly slamming his toes and elbows on various things. By the end, he’s thoroughly, regrettably awake. 

Might as well make something out of this artificial insomnia. He heads towards the training room. 

He finds Carolina twisting and kicking and punching at floating spiraling targets, and he isn’t even surprised. 

Tucker mentally gasps.  _ <Sexual jumper cables.> _

Wash trips and almost falls on his face. “Don’t call her that!” he shrieks. 

“Call me what?” Carolina asks. 

Wash looks at her guilty. His near faceplant and urgent protest has basically obliterated any chance of stealth that he had. “Uh,” he says, “nothing.” 

“Hmm,” Carolina says, and turns her focus back onto her targets. Wash relaxes. 

Tucker is poking at his brain again. _ <How is something still not stirring?> _ he asks, disbelieving.  _ <Look at her!> _

“She’s wearing full armor,” he mutters to himself as he heads over to the weights. 

_ <Yeah but look at that  _ ass!>

He briefly hides his face in his hands and groans. 

“AI bothering you?” Carolina asks without stopping her workout, sounding a little sympathetic. 

“You could say that,” Wash says, settling down with some dumbbells. 

“Just ignore him,” she advises him. 

_ <Wash. Skintight. Kevlar.> _

“Easier said than done.” 

“The trick is to not say anything at all.” 

A small glowing blue man in armor appears behind Carolina’s shoulder, and he waves enthusiastically over at Wash. 

“Hi! Hello! I’m Caboose!” 

There’s a feeling rolling through him like some just gutpunched him breathless, and Wash holds his breath for a moment instinctively. 

Caboose wilts a little as Wash doesn’t respond, his hand going down and his shoulders slumping. 

Tucker, in glowing aqua, appears floating besides Wash. 

“Hi,” he says. “I’m Tucker.” 

Caboose glows so brightly that Wash has to squeeze his eyes shut, blue penetrating his eyelids like taking a nap underneath the sun. 

“HI TUCKER,” Caboose hollers so loudly that Wash wonders what the volume capacity is on their armor. 

“--you don’t have to shout!” Tucker protests belatedly. He doesn’t feel angry or exasperated. He still feels off kilter and shaken and a little bit confused. 

“I’M NOT SHOUTING,” Caboose shouts. “I’M JUST HAPPY!” 

“Caboose, stop glowing,” Carolina says, sounding deeply annoyed. Wash still has to keep his eyes shut. It must be difficult hitting targets like this. 

Wash can feel Tucker’s urge to walk closer to them tingling in his  _ toes. _

“I’M NOT GLOWING, I’M JUST HAPPY.” 

“You’re so stupid!” Tucker says, and radiates desperate confused happiness inside of Wash’s skull. Wash puts a hand up to his visor to try and block out the blue glow more and takes a deep breath, trying to breathe through the emotions. 

_ “You’re _ stupid!” Caboose says joyfully. 

“No,  _ you’re  _ stupid!” 

“No, you!” 

“No,  _ you!”  _

This is weird and stupid and intense and completely inexplicable. But at least Wash doesn’t have to try and explain to Tucker what asexuality is three in the morning. He’ll take it. 


	17. off the bench

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Oh come on, baby, don’t be like that.” 
> 
> _ <Don’t call me  _ baby,> Simmons hisses shrilly. 
> 
> “Don’t be like that, bro.” 

The doctor’s finger traces slowly along the chart, pauses at a new, smaller shape. A new letter. 

_ <E,> _ Simmons says. 

York’s mouth twitches. “E.” 

Her finger starts moving again. He’s distracted by how blue her eyes are. Simmons has to mentally poke at him. 

_ <F,> _ he hisses. 

York coughs. “F.” 

They continue like this for a while, and then eventually, thankfully, the doctor leaves. 

“Simmons,” York says the second the door closes behind her. “You didn’t need to help me cheat.” 

Simmons pops up. “What’s wrong with a second opinion?” 

“On a  _ letter test? _ Simmons, either you succeed on that one or you don’t. They’re just checking to see how blind I am so I don’t accidentally shoot one of my teammates by mistake on the field or something.” 

“I wouldn’t let that happen!” 

“But I can see on my own! You don’t have to help me with this!” He laughs. “You’re being ridiculous.” 

Simmons radiates flustered anger, and disappears in a huff. 

“Oh come on, baby, don’t be like that.” 

_ <Don’t call me  _ baby,> Simmons hisses shrilly. 

“Don’t be like that, bro.” 

_ <I’ll be however I want to be and also my actions are completely justified and  _ you’re _ being ridiculous! > _

“Okay,” York says. 

Simmons, who can feels York’s feelings, radiates dissatisfaction. York grins. This is already better than the constant determined anxious stress of the last few weeks. And hey, he really  _ isn’t blind.  _ He hadn’t let himself dwell on the possibility that he was, but… yeah, he’s relieved. 

“I feel like doing something,” he says. “Something… eye-y. Read a book? Draw a picture? Play eye spy?” 

_ <You have a message from the Director,> _ Simmons says, presumably the nanosecond it’s received. 

“Orrr I could just immediately go back to work the second I’m okay again, I guess. That sounds fun too.” 

 

York was being facetious, to be honest. Just a little bit. Sure, he had the leg up of being recommended by the first Freelancer PFL had at the time, but he still got accepted. And to be accepted into Project Freelancer you kinda  _ have _ to be a bit of a workaholic adrenaline junkie. Someone who lives to be shot at, and to shoot at others. York may not be as bad as Carolina’ but Carolina’s a high fucking bar. It’s been weeks since York’s last mission, and the inactivity and boredom (and the fear, the worst kind of fear, the kind he couldn’t do anything at all about except just sit there and wait and see and try and not let Simmons’ constant background hum of sick anxiety  _ drive him crazy) _ is itching underneath his skin. 

He may bitch about it some, but he walks quickly and with a perk in his step to the Director’s office. 

Simmons is buzzing with nerves in the back of his head, but not like when York still couldn’t see shit. 

“What’s up?” he asks. 

_ <Hmmmmm?> _ Simmons hums with panicked innocence. 

“This thing you do, where you try and hide that you’re having an emotion from someone who can feel your emotions? It’s so stupid, dude. But also what’s up? You feel all… jittery.” 

Simmons radiates intense discomfort. York would love to know why reacts to every inquiry into his feelings as if it’s a vulgar personal attack. 

_ <Just,> _ Simmons eventually haltingly manages to make himself say as York patiently continues not to save him from the increasingly awkward silence, _ <I don’t know. You can see now.> _

Another long pause. York nonchalantly whistles. 

_ <Which is good!> _ Simmons rushes to say in the void of a response.  _ <I’m happy! Uh. I am. I just. Don’t know what to do now? I don’t know… It’s like? Such a big relief that I can’t process it? Except my processors are  _ state of the art-->

“I think I get what you’re talking about,” he says thoughtfully. He’s reminded of the come down from some of his most intense missions, where he was so consumed with surviving the present that he didn’t even have time to afford to think about later, about when he could just sit down and relax. Sometimes nothing had felt real for days afterwards. “You were that worried about me?” 

Which is a stupid question, because York had been able to feel exactly how worried Simmons had been. It was just that he’d been trying to ignore it to stop  _ himself _ from worrying. And Simmons had helped by desperately trying to ignore it too, trying not to get so fear distracted that he couldn’t work properly. York is starting to suspect that Simmons might just not like dwelling on feelings in general, though. 

_ <I-- you-- shut up! I was a reasonable amount of worried! I wasn’t worried at all! I am an emotionless AI capable only of cold hard logic! Fuck you!> _

His voice is cracking. York bites his lip, smiling. 

“Love you too, buddy.” 

Simmons makes a literal high pitched dial up noise and then descends into overloaded fritz noise, a dull  _ shhhhh  _ sound that reminds him of shitty TVs acting up. York snickers. 

York enters the Director’s office. 

The man himself is standing with his back to York, reading something on a pad, and he doesn’t bother turning around at the swish of the door opening. So  _ dramatic.  _

“Sir,” he says, just in case he doesn’t know who’s just entered his office. 

“Sir,” Simmons echoes, popping up in his little maroon man hologram at York’s shoulder. He feels nervous and eager, a little nauseous. 

“York, I have a mission for you,” the Director says, still without turning around to look at him. Honestly. 

York still isn’t used to a chilly stoic super genius with a thick hick accent. There’s a brief spike of indignation that feels like a scandalized gasp from Simmons, and his mouth twitches in a brief smile. Well, he’s right, isn’t he? 

“Happy to hear I’m off the bench, sir,” he says. 

“We’ll do whatever it is!” Simmons says with enough pep for a head cheerleader. “Sir!” 

Ah, great. As if Carolina’s intense loyalty for the Director isn’t enough, now he’s got to deal with it from Simmons too. Not that he’s got anything against being loyal; he just likes being able to shittalk his boss a bit. All in good fun, of course. The guy’s  _ weird.  _ Uptight. 

Not that he has much of a leg to stand on complaining about that, considering how close he is to Carolina and Simmons. 

(He hasn’t seen Carolina in a while, but that isn’t strange. She’s possibly a bigger workaholic than even the Director, who seems to live for his job. The Director seems to have nothing outside of his job; Carolina deliberately puts all she is and more into it. She’s just busy right now. Nothing personal. He’s used to it. He’ll see her again.) 

“It’s a rescue mission,” says the Director. 


	18. fill in the details as we go

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wash and Tucker had been sent to this island to quickly zoom in, grab some experimental weaponry from the enemy’s secret labs that they had discovered merely hours ago, and then zoom right back out. It was a stupidly simple plan. Some would say stupid enough to be foolproof. Some other more right people would say stupid enough to be guaranteed to go wrong, and oh wow, look at that, they’d tripped up some kind of alarm and had managed to get themselves locked inside of the building with no way out. Who could have possible predicted that they’d get stopped by a lock (or in this case, very many locks) because some genius didn’t think to send in the  _ fucking lock breaker _ in the  _ first fucking place?  _
> 
> No, Simmons doesn’t feel resentful or slighted at  _ all. _

There’s a problem, and it’s that North and York don’t hang out together enough. 

“What are you _ talking _ about,” York says. “We’ve started spending twice as much time together since we got you guys.” 

_ <I only get to see Grif for a few hours a day,> _ he sulks. He’s fine with admitting that he wants to see Grif more to York because it’s York; they keep each other’s feelings and thoughts secret, if that’s what they want the other to do. He’s fine with admitting that he wants to see Grif more to himself because he has a _ lot _ of justifications in store. Donut’s Agent is too mean. Sarge’s Agent is too creepy. Caboose’s Agent is too flat out scary. Wash is tolerable but Tucker himself isn’t worth it. So, logically, Grif is the only AI left who’s viable for hang outs, and that’s barely even scratching the surface of his hour long Powerpoint presentation of why he just has no other choice but to be friends with Grif, it really is unfortunate. Except York isn’t letting him. 

“A few hours every day is a lot! I still have to do things  _ besides _ spending time with North. You know, eating, sleeping, training, showering, spending time with people who  _ aren’t _ North.” 

_ <You can do all of those things while being with North.> _ York is being completely unreasonable. 

“... Seriously? Oh my god, you’re serious.” 

Simmons is dead serious, and he doesn’t get what the big deal is. 

“Simmons, if I had to spend that much time with someone, I’d go crazy and stab them.” 

_ <That sounds fake,> _ he says. 

And it does.  _ Not  _ spending nearly every hour of the day next to Grif’s side is, well, kind of driving him crazy. Obviously it’s York who’s wrong here. Simmons isn’t weird. For an AI. 

“No, listen, this is  _ not _ normal. This is another time when you’re limited life experience is warping your world view, trust me.” Belatedly, a worry sprouts in York’s brain that maybe it was mean to imply that Simmons isn’t normal, that that’s the kind of thing he gets insecure about--

Simmons ignores the worry as best he can. He has an unfortunate habit of accidentally worsening York’s anxieties if he pays attention to them. Some bug in his code that they aren’t going to alert anyone about because the techs and the doctors and the scientists and the soldiers guarding with guns freak them _ both  _ out now. Rough implantation. Simmons’ fault. 

“Simmons--” York says, concern in his voice, and Simmons focuses back on the argument with a vengeance to distract from the unpleasant feelings and memories creeping up on them. 

_ <I’m a super smart AI, which more than makes up for my short lifespan so far.> _

“Says the one year old,” York snarks back automatically, which is good, which is nice. He’s distracted. Success. Simmons feels a faint flicker of satisfaction at that, his own, and then it’s amplified by York noticing it and being pleased by it. Feedback loop. The bug in his code. Occasionally pleasant, more often than not dangerous. Again, Simmons’ fault. 

York picks up the ball and helps them move on. “Actually, now that I think about it, says the _ zero  _ year old. Still got some months to go, eh?” 

_ <My reasoning makes perfect sense! We hang out together  _ all  _ of the time and get along just fine, right?> _ He pauses for a moment as he realizes that he just made a decent point. He then pauses to deliberately radiate as much smugness as possible over making a decent point. 

He can feel York roll his eyes. “That’s  _ different.”  _

_ <How!?> _

“You’re my AI! You’re in my head, we can read each other’s emotions and thoughts and junk. Perfect empathy. Sort of. I can’t imagine how I possibly  _ couldn’t  _ get along with you. I’d have to actively try or something, and why the hell would I try not to get along with someone who lives in my head?”

_ “If you two’re done jabbing your jaws, or ready to shut up for like a  _ second, _ then I just want you guys to know that you need to jump off within the next two minutes if you want to be even vaguely on target,” _ 479er cuts in dryly over the ship comms.  _ “Not that it isn’t  _ so _ interesting to get to listen to half of a conversation.”  _

_ <This argument isn’t over.> _

“Yes it is, I won, jumping out of the plane now.” 

_ <I am making a note to get back to this argument as soon as possible, as in I’m creating an actual document in my files.> _

York just sighs, and jumps out of the plane. Without a parachute. 

_ <YORK,> _ he blares.  _ <YORK YOU FORGOT YOUR--> _

“Jesus!” York shouts over the howling of the wind. “I know, Simmons! It was on purpose!” 

_ <WHAT!?> _

Simmons hadn’t seen this coming  _ at all.  _ Even though he lives in York’s brain! The apparently deliberate choice to forego a parachute had just slipped underneath his radar, just like those entirely natural, unremarked upon impulses to scratch his nose or cross his arms or curl his fist just right for a punch. Like there’s nothing strange about this at all. 

_ <York,> _ Simmons says with horror. _ <Do you just _ not use parachutes?>

York doesn’t have time to respond in any way to that besides with a quick damning mental flash of defensiveness and a little guilt, because the ground is rushing rapidly closer to meet with them. 

They meet the ground. 

York lets out an “oof!” and rolls down the slightly sloped hill. As he rolls to a stop Simmons, at a loss for words, just shoves a general feeling of incredulity/fear/disbelief at him. 

“What?” he says. “If 479er had dropped me off at a high enough altitude for me to use a parachute I would’ve just been shot out of the sky by the turrets-- she might be able to do an aerial barrel roll to avoid a missile, but I can’t if I’m being gently lowered to the ground by a piece of fabric.”

_ <York. Do you ask 479er to drop you off low enough to forego parachutes even when you don’t have to?> _

“I’d like to not answer the question? Come on, let’s get out of the open before the enemy realizes that the plane left something behind to shoot at instead.” He gets up and stretches, and Simmons takes note of the hideous bruises that are going to appear on the side of his body. Low priority, he won’t bother trying to heal them before they’ve gotten through the mission. He wouldn’t want to waste precious power if York got a much more urgent injury later. 

_ <Stop dodging arguments with me!> _

“I’d rather not have to dodge _ bullets, _ Simmons.” 

Above them, 479er fruitlessly drops some bombs on the island a safe distance away from them to help sell the idea that she wasn’t here to drop off any one man infiltration and extraction teams, no siree. 

_ <We can argue and hide at the same time.> _ To demonstrate, he nudges York’s focus towards some foliage that should make for decent cover to go unnoticed as he disagrees with him.  _ <I can’t believe you wouldn’t use a parachute.> _

“Well, this is a stealth mission, you know. There’s nothing quite as conspicuous as a parachute during broad daylight.” Dutifully he moves into the foliage as they bicker, crouch running low to the ground to make sure he’s fully covered, handily proving Simmons’ point. 

_ <They should have let us wait until it was dark,> _ he grumbles, distracted from one grievance by another. 

“I doubt Wash would be able to keep avoid being captured for that long. Sure, he’s fast, but these fancy armor units suck up power fast, and you can only avoid--what was it, three dozen guards?--for so long when you’re stuck in a locked building with them.” 

Wash and Tucker had been sent to this island to quickly zoom in, grab some experimental weaponry from the enemy’s secret labs that they had discovered merely hours ago, and then zoom right back out. It was a stupidly simple plan. Some would say stupid enough to be foolproof. Some other more right people would say stupid enough to be guaranteed to go wrong, and oh wow, look at that, they’d tripped up some kind of alarm and had managed to get themselves locked inside of the building with no way out. Who could have possible predicted that they’d get stopped by a lock (or in this case, very many locks) because some genius didn’t think to send in the  _ fucking lock breaker _ in the  _ first fucking place?  _

No, Simmons doesn’t feel resentful or slighted at  _ all. _

_ <Forty guards,> _ he corrects him. 

“Man, what the hell were they thinking sending the rookie in on a solo mission like this? I think this might be his first one.” 

_ <I see the building,> _ Simmons says. He does. It’s squat and gray and boxy, surrounded by various vehicles and a large, broad field that it’ll be hell to sneak past. He knows from the blueprints he got to download that there’s far more to the building than first meets the eye, floor upon floor sprouting underneath the ground instead of up, like an iceberg. Also, there’s a guard at every visible exit holding a gun and an eye out, presumably just to be sure. He assumes the rests of the guards are locked inside of the building with Tucker and Wash, playing the most intense game of hide and seek of their lives. 

“I’m still gonna drag him for this, though,” he goes on, slowly circling the building from some distance away, still hidden by the foliage. 

Simmons kind of likes it when York’s a little mean to people, so he won’t say anything to try and dissuade him from this decision. It’s hilarious.  _ <There!> _ he hisses, victorious, even though no one but York can hear him right now, no matter how loud he gets.  _ <There’s a camera blind spot right there!> _

“Yeah, and a guard,” he mutters back, but he doesn’t sound all that dubious. 

_ <Yeah,> _ he says. <One  _ guard.> _

And really, he doesn’t have to say anything more. If York can’t handle a single guard, he might as well just turn in his (nonexistent) Freelancer badge now, and do whatever it is retired Freelancer do. Get executed to maintain secrecy? Ha, no, that’s a little extreme. 

Going by body language, the guard is, as many guards are, both tense and bored. He turns his head every few seconds to look in different direction, and he intermittently paces in front of his door, finger restlessly tapping against the safety of his gun. Simmons can see a walkie talkie on his belt, and he’s within shouting distance of other guards besides. And all it’d take to alert the rest of them would be a single gunshot anyways. 

Their genius plan to get past him: York waits until he’s looking away and then he flat out sprints at him as fast as he can without loudly slamming his boots against the ground. He’s fast, but he’s no Wash either; the guard turns his head back and spots him as he’s less than a dozen feet away. He startles back and gets out the beginning of a yell as he lifts his gun, and then York slams into him with his entire body, fist driving into his solar plexus, driving the breath and exclamation out of him. His light armor and their combined body weight clangs against the wall with a noise that sounds horribly loud to Simmons. They’re caught. They’re dead. 

_ “He’s  _ dead,” York grunts, and gives the guard a power armored punch hard enough to crush his windpipe. He lowers the wheezing, suffocating man to the ground as the walkie talkie on the guard’s belt crackles. 

_ “Smith, what the fuck was that?” _

York unclips the walkie talkie and raises it up to his helmet. “Turned out to be nothing,” he says in an unruffled voice, even though Simmons can feel his heart beating twice as fast as usual. 

The other guard knows this one well enough to remember his name; he’ll recognize that his voice is different. This won’t work. This can’t work. 

A pause, and then,  _ “Get it together, man.”  _

The walkie talkie clicks off. The dying guard scrabbles at York’s feet, his struggles rapidly weakening, his face shifting into fascinating colors and drool flowing from his mouth unchecked, unimportant in the face of what’s happening to him. York takes his gun from him just to be safe, and then steps over him to get started on the lock, not even waiting for him to die first. 

Holy fuck, it actually worked. 

_ <Keep the walkie,> _ Simmons suggests, still feeling a little lightheaded after that close call, and York hums in agreement and clips it somewhere secure. It could come in handy later.

“Alright, what do we have here…” he murmurs to himself as he bends down to look at the lock. 

And that’s when shit starts to go wrong. It always is: when York’s supposed to pick the lock. He’s  _ good,  _ is the thing. He can pick hundreds of different kinds of locks in record time, while being shot at, while being looked for, while under a time limit, while in pain, anything. So long as it’s a simulated exercise. So long as it’s a test, a drill. 

Now, he can hear marching footsteps, horribly close, and Simmons can feel his fingers itch for his gun as he fumbles with wires, and his mind keeps trying to stray away from the fiddly task that requires total focus towards something easier, something more instinctual, like hitting and kicking and killing. Something that requires near zero thought or patience while in a dangerous situation, almost pure reflex. 

It had seemed so out of place, considering York’s calm casual competency in almost everything else. York had promised him that he’d been like this even before Simmons had come along; he’s always been like this, his brain has always whited out while under pressure, snappish and a little panicky. It isn’t Simmons’ fault. It doesn’t come from him. He’d  _ promised, _ no lie lurking in his mind. 

All he can do is try his best not to panic along with him, to magnify it even further. 

A wire that shouldn’t snap snaps. An alarm starts shrieking. York swears. 

Simmons isn’t sure he’s doing a very good job of it. 

The marching footsteps are now running, and York snatches the walkie talkie and snaps off into it, “I think I saw someone on the--” mind too scrambled for directions, Simmons supplies,  _ “--East  _ side of the building, running away into the jungle!” 

The side of the building as far away from them as possible. 

_ “Roger that, Smith! He’s getting away!”  _

The footsteps run away, so close before. Simmons feels relieved but  _ shaky, _ too close, too close. York takes a deep breath, slowly releases it. 

“Come on,” he says, voice low and almost normal sounding. “Time’s a wastin.” 

York makes his second attempt on the nearest other door, now abandoned. They’re still rushed, but less so. Simmons recognizes this lock, hundreds of different designs downloaded into him, and he cuts in with corrections whenever it seems like York’s straying. 

_ <It’s the  _ red  _ wire,> _ he says. 

“I  _ know  _ that,” he mutters crossly back at him, and Simmons knows he does, even if he’d been lingering over the green wire instead. 

The door wooshes open, alarms don’t ring, and they quickly and quietly slip in through the door and close it behind them with no interruptions. They’re inside. They did it. 

Simmons really has to stop being so surprised every time they survive something. 

There’s still so much more to survive and do, though. York lowers his centre of gravity to help keep his footsteps quiet as he runs as fast as he dares through the halls. 

“See if the enemy’s scramblers aren’t working any longer on Wash’s coms now that we’re inside the building,” he reminds him. Right. Tucker had barely had time to inform Command of the barebones of the situation, and then he’d been cut off mid sentence. Simmons hopes it hadn’t been a sentence like ‘and no matter what you do don’t--’. It’d really be just their luck. 

He opens a com channel, reaching for the connection that should lead them to Wash’s suit.

_ <Wash? Tucker?> _ he asks. He doesn’t have to use York’s speakers to make himself heard over the channel, isn’t forced to whisper not to be overheard by guards; it’s all electronics, so easy to manipulate, especially if all he’s doing is speaking with his own voice. 

(“How do you have your own voice?” York had asked him curiously, dubiously. “I know that’s not the default recording for all English male-coded AIs you’re using. Did they get a voice actor to give each of you your own unique voices?  _ Why?  _ What’s the point?” 

Simmons, at  _ least  _ as bugged by the nonsensical mystery as York was, could do nothing but give his best attempt at a mental shrug.)

_ <Ohthankfuck,> _ Tucker replies.  _ <Extraction team’s _ finally _ here! > _

<Finally?> Simmons can’t help but repeat with peevish incredulity. York and he’d been woken up in the middle of the night for this, barely briefed before being shoved onto a ship piloted by 479er at her fastest and most reckless speed. They were going to have to strategically nap for the next few days to get their circadian rhythm back on track. 

“York!” Wash whispers excitedly into the comms, voice radiating just as much relief while still retaining a nervous tenseness to it; they’re still behind enemy lines, even if rescue is within sight. “Who else came with?” 

There’s a moment of silence. 

“... York, who else came with?” 

“Look, this is a stealth op--”

_ <Oh my god,> _ Tucker breathes with horror. _ <It’s just you two bozos--> _

_ <Excuse me!?> _ Simmons jumps to their defense. <Bozos?  _ Unlike you, we actually managed to infiltrate the building without being detected, so--> _

_ <Actually, so did we just fine. It was the leaving without being detected that gave us some trouble… I’d like to see you do better, nerd.> _

“Well, our lives kind of depend on it,” Wash says. 

_ <It wouldn’t if they’d sent in, like, Carolina, or--> _

“Don’t even joke about that,” Wash says, sounding a little nauseous at the thought. 

“She’d be  _ pissed _ at being made to clean up your mess,” York says with amused fondness at the thought. Simmons manfully endures it, because he’s a good AI partner. Thankfully, his thoughts turn back to business before they can travel too far down… that  _ other  _ road. “Wash, where are you?”

“... In the vents,” he reluctantly admits. 

That gives both York and Simmons pause for a moment. “Wouldn’t it make more sense for you to zip around in the corridors? It can’t be easy using your unit in cramped quarters.”

They’d both watched (and laughed themselves sick at) training footage of Wash sprinting full speed straight into a wall, actually leaving an impression of himself in the plaster like some sort of Looney Tunes cartoon, trying to get the hang of using his unit in less open spaces. It was an extremely amusing and slow going process. 

_ <We’re at less than 10% power,> _ Tucker says.  _ <I’ve got a feeling your exit isn’t going be any more subtle than ours attempted one, and I want to save that power for our last burst to freedom before I have to do a forced shutdown.> _

_ <We’ll see about that,> _ Simmons grumps, but he’s still unsettled at the information. Forced shutdowns aren’t fun for anyone involved. 

“Okay, well, if you’ve managed to stay undetected for this long, do you think you could crawl your way to my location? I’m in--”

“Um,” Wash interrupts. “No.” 

“... No?” 

_ <That’s… a strong no,> _ Tucker says, and he sounds as shifty and sheepish as Wash does. 

“What’s wrong?” York immediately sternly asks, internal alarm bells beginning to ring. 

_ <What have they done now?> _ Simmons silently asks his host, longsuffering. Wash and Tucker have an almost impressive talent for finding ways to fuck up despite being good enough to be on the leaderboard. He doesn’t understand it. 

“We’re… we’re stuck.” 

“... Like, you can’t move without being noticed or--?” 

“I’m  _ stuck,  _ York.” 

_ <This armor’s really bulky, man.> _

There follows several long moments of York trying desperately not to laugh loudly enough to be noticed by the enemy, Simmons shamelessly laughing as loudly as he wants within York’s head, and a distinctly embarrassed silence from Wash and Tucker’s end of the line. Sheepish embarrassment on Wash’s side, resentful flustered embarrassment on Tucker’s. It’s downright  _ uncanny _ how clearly it comes through. 

“Okay…!” York wheezes, sounding strangled. “Okay, we’re coming to you then. Oh, Jesus.” 

They turn a corner and come face to face with a guard. York has them on the ground, gun clattering away before their expression can even shift away from shock. The laughter’s wiped away in less than a second, in less time it takes for York to punch the guard so heavily in the face that he’s knocked unconscious immediately. He’ll probably need reconstructive surgery. They really should have incorporated full face helmets for their guard uniforms.

This one, York doesn’t kill. The circumstances are dire, urgent, but they don’t feel as much so as they did at the door outside, desperately trying to neutralize the guard before he could make sound while trying to make as little sound as possible in turn. He crushes the walkie talkie underneath his boot, and drags the guard into a closet, wrists zip tied. 

York’s stolen walkie crackles,  _ “Smith, are you sure that was a person you saw?”  _

Simmons can privately admit to himself that they were never going to get out of here without a fuss anyways. He doesn’t like killing unconscious people either. If they’re struggling, he doesn’t feel obligated to feel so much as an iota of regret or guilt. Sleeping people though, fainted people; that’s a step too far for the both of them. 

_ “Think _ so, sir,” York tries. 

_ “... Did you just call me sir, Smith?”  _ His hesitant tone indicates that this is unusual. 

And here comes the fuss. 

York doesn’t even try to save it. The illusion was flimsy enough not to be able to stand a single grain of scrutiny. It would just be a waste of time. He starts running down the hallway towards Wash’s position, supplied to Simmons by a ping from Tucker. 

_ “Everyone, off the walkies!” _ the man barks, and then the walkie talkie goes silent. 

York drops it to the floor without a glance back. It could potentially be used to track them, now that they’ve been made. 

_ <Should we call for help?> _ Simmons asks. This was supposed to be a stealth op, after all. He doesn’t really like the sound of two men against over three dozen armed and armoured men. _ <An air strike from 479er, maybe?> _

“We’re under the enemy’s scrambler now, too, Simmons,” York gently breaks to him. 

Simmons feels shocked, and then like a moron.  _ Duh. _ Of course they’re scrambled, they wouldn’t be able to reach Tucker and Wash on comms if they weren’t. They’re just lucky that whatever machine or program’s doing this is exclusively focusing on outgoing messages instead of everything within the field. 

Jesus, and Simmons is supposed to be the brains of this operation.  _ He’s literally nothing but brains.  _ This is an outrage. 

_ <Okay,> _ he says.  _ <Okay. Fine. Great! This is totally doable! We just have to get over to Wash and Tucker  _ fast, _ pull their fat asses out of the vent-- > _

_ <Hey!> _ Tucker protests.  _ <I think you mean _ Wash’s  _ fat ass, I’m intangible. Also, Wash’s ass is awesome!> _

“That’s okay Tucker you don’t need to defend me,” Wash rushes to say. 

“Please tell me you recorded that, Simmons,” York says. 

_ <I record all of our missions,> _ he huffs. And he only edits them to make them look better a  _ little  _ bit. He’s not lying or anything, he’s just, uh, framing the story! Everyone does it.  _ <Anyways, we somehow pull them out, somehow get out of the building alive past all of the guards, and somehow get picked up by 479er without her or us getting shot down in the process, flying off into the sunset to give the Director a report that doesn’t make us look like a bunch of incompetent dumbasses, somehow.> _

“That’s a lot of somehows,” York remarks. 

_ <I’m-- I’m just outlining! This is the first draft, I’ll fill in the details as we go!> _

“Is he talking about saving our lives or writing a book?” Wash whisper-asks Tucker. 

“Isn’t that just improvising?” York asks. 

_ <I would  _ never  _ improvise. I’m smart, I make plans.> _

“And your plan is to come up with the details as you go.”

_ <Yes! As a matter of fact, it is!> _

York grins. “I like it.” 

-

They kill one guard and take down two more on their way to Tucker and Wash. Tucker makes three nervous jokes jokes about it ‘being too tight’ and that ‘they should have used lube’ as time passes and guards run right by their position. York gets tasered once and Simmons helps numb the pain as best he can so he doesn’t get distracted during the brief but intense scuffle with the guard, and then he repairs any minute damage to the nerves as he continues sneaking closer. No other injuries. Still pretty high on power. 

They are not going to die horribly. Or let Wash and Tucker die horribly and disappoint the Director and make Caboose sad. They just aren’t! Despite all contrary evidence! Because York and Simmons are great. York is fantastically good at beating people up, Simmons is a smart AI who can literally heal his host and he is  _ not _ going to panic and fuck things up, Tucker and Wash  _ can  _ actually be competent when it matters, 479er is the best flier ever 

  
  


_ but if there’s one thing he can do, at least, it’s fly. He’s amazing at it, to be completely honest, which he isn’t going to be, because, um,  _ embarrassing. 

  
  


When Simmons comes to, dizzy and confused, York is leaning heavily against a wall. Simmons’ first instinct is to check his inner ear for damage, and his second is to flood York’s brain with his very unhelpful panic as he notices that there’s a guard a few feet in front of them, looking straight at them. Holding them at gunpoint. Speaking into his walkie talkie. 

“--just standing there, doesn’t even seem to know that I’m here? Yeah, I’m in the hallway with the closet where everyone fucks--”

Simmons is mostly very condensed circuitry and software and electricity, but in this moment he feels like a machine made of precisely fitted gears all turning in unison, coming together and apart perfectly. Except someone just jammed a bunch of bullshit into his gears. Utensils for the teeth of his gears to break themselves on, glue to slow them down and freeze them in place, the entirety of him groaning and creaking as his mind goes to pieces, doesn’t move, _ breaks.  _

He’d told himself that he wouldn’t fuck this up for them. That they wouldn’t fail. And now there’s a gun pointed at them and all of the enemies knows their exact current location. The hallway with the closet where everyone fucks. 

He wants to laugh. And cry. And scream. And break something. 

<Break him,> he hisses. 

York lunges for the guard all at once, and he gets shot. 

In the shoulder, between the armor plates. The kevlar doesn’t stand a chance at such a close range. The bullet rends through meat and bone, and then lodges itself into the inside of an armor plate instead of exiting York on the other side. Simmons won’t have to plug two holes. Simmons will have to figure out what to do with that bullet stuck inside of York. 

York has to kill this man,  _ now.  _

_ <GOGOGOKILLHIM> _ he roars inside of York’s skull, trying to flood it with his own adrenaline and panic fueled rage. 

This all happens in less than a second. The shot isn’t even done ringing out, York hasn’t even fallen yet. 

He doesn’t fall. His body is jerked back a bit with the momentum and the pain of the bullet, but then he gives a full throated roar and just throws himself at the guard faster, with more desperation. He doesn’t get the chance to shoot him a second time. 

York is too pained and panicked and rushed for anything fancy. He just takes the guard down with him onto the floor, gun clattering out of both of their reach, gets his arms around his neck in a hold that makes his shoulder scream, and starts trying to suffocate him as the guard desperately paws at him. 

Simmons starts focusing on his job. The shoulder. Blood loss comes above all else. He needs to jumpstart the coagulation process, close the hole, stop the flow. He does so, and York lets out a pained wheeze and further tightens his hold on the guard’s neck at the stress Simmons is putting on his body, at how quickly he’s making it heal, but speed’s the name of the game here. Have to stop the bleeding. 

By the time York’s bleeding has slowed to something more manageable, the guard has stopped struggling. By the time Simmons has started trying to fix the worst of what’s happened to York’s bones, stop it from healing wrong and getting worse with each little movement, the guard isn’t breathing any longer. York gets up as quickly as he can, sways from the bloodrush and pain. 

Their location is known. A gunshot rang out. 

That bullet is just going to have to stay there for now, because now they’re  _ really _ in a fucking hurry. 

“Fight’s over,” York mumbles as he forces himself to start taking steps away from the scene of the crime. Simmons wonders why--

“You okay?” Wash asks, his voice hushed concern. 

Right. Wash and Tucker know not to speak when they’re in a fight, knows not to distract them. 

“Will be,” he says, and makes a pained smile for the benefit of no one-- no, it’s for Simmons. Simmons can tell that he’s smiling. “Thank god I’ve got Simmons, eh?” 

Thank god. Like it isn’t because of Simmons’ weird infectious blackout bullshit that he’s too chickenshit to let York tell anyone about that he got shot in the first place. He would’ve killed that guard without being heard by a soul if he’d been alone. 

“Now is not the time,” York says, voice lower, clearly meant for him. “You’re doing good, okay?”

It feels wrong to get praise after such a humongous fuck up. Like he’s getting away with something, except York knows exactly what he did. He feels--

_ Now is not the time.  _

“The guard managed to tell the rest of his buddies where we are before I got him,” York goes on, voice tight with pain. “This part of the building will be crawling with enemies in no time flat.”

_ <Oh shit,> _ Tucker says.  _ <So it’s time to abandon stealth?> _

“I’d say that.” 

_ <Okay, cool.> _

_ <We’re here,> _ Simmons says. The vent cover that will lead them to Tucker and Wash is only a few feet above them on the wall. He thinks he can even see a glimpse of the orange-yellow of Wash’s visor. He starts trying to figure out the somehow of getting them out of there. 

_ <Swish!> _

And then abruptly there’s a flat, pointy, faintly humming blue shape sticking out at an angle from the wall. York gapes at it. The shape moves, leaving behind a line of melted metal as it does. 

“What… the _ fuck…”  _ York breathes. 

_ <It’s the tech we stole!> _ Tucker enthusiastically informs them.  _ <Pretty fucking cool, eh?> _

Simmons spends a moment to gather his composure. 

<WHY DIDN’T YOU USE IT BEFORE NOW!?>

The shape--the sword?-- jerks a little, and Wash swears softly before correcting his slow circular course. 

_ <Don’t distract him! And we thought a glowing blue laser sword wouldn’t be too subtle, y’know? Especially if we’re gonna be using it like  _ this.>

A decent chunk of metal falls to the floor with a loud clang. Simmons’ anxiety spikes, and then he remembers that they’ve had to abandon stealth anyways. His anxiety spikes again. 

The laser sword goes away as quickly as it appeared, and Wash reaches out a an arm towards York. York sighs through his nose, rolls his eyes, and reaches up with what’s his good arm now and grabs Wash’s hand, helping him out. 

Simmons hears approaching footsteps as Wash lands on the floor. Many of them, thundering closer. 

“So, do you think you’ve got that somehow prepared by now, Simmons?” York asks. 

_ <Um,> _ he says, and then,  _ <\--wait, Wash, Tucker! Do you know where the communications scrambler is?> _

“Uh, sure, but that thing’s being heavily guarded-- ohhhhh.” 

All of the guards are heading towards _ them.  _

_ <I’ll hack it!> _ he happily suggests. 

_ <Or we can just instantly destroy it with our super cool laser sword.> _

_ <... My solution’s more elegant,> _ he grumbles. 

The first guard turns the corner into their hallway. 

“Lead the way, Wash,” York says, and shoots them right in the face. 

Wash activates his sword and smiles, nervous and excited. “Do you think 479er will be happy when I tell her she can blow this place up?” 

The answer to that question is obvious, so they all just focus on fighting their way towards their objective. 

-

479er gleefully systematically destroys the building, safe with the knowledge of knowing exactly which parts of the building her allies are in. York gets a cracked visor, two bullet grazes, and a whole lot of bruises, but nothing as serious as that first gunshot to the shoulder. Wash gets shot in the leg and gets a shot of biofoam for his troubles. None of the guards know how to deal with the laser sword, several of them actually trying to block it instead of dodge it. It doesn’t end well for them. 

They sprint for the shore as 479er swoops down to meet them and the remains of the research facility smolders behind them, Wash’s arm thrown around York’s shoulder as they limp-run as fast as they can. 

“Talk about a quick in and out, eh, rookie?” York teases. 

Wash groans. “I’m never going to live this down.” 

“Not if I’ve got any say in it.” 

They fly home, and Simmons viciously edits his recordings to try and make that guard sneaking up on them look reasonable. He spends as much power as he needs to to get York as healed up as he can be in the span of one flight, now that he doesn’t need to save it for emergencies. Wash and Tucker bicker. 479er complains about only getting to hear one sided bickering nowadays. She does some loops and Simmons tries not to scream. It gives York headaches. 

They finally get home, and the Director is standing there sternly in the hangar with his hands clasped behind his back. 

“Agent Washington,” he says. 

Wash immediately stands up straight and tense. Simmons hears him gulp, and not even York can find that much humor in it. The Director’s… It’s not fun, to disappoint the Director. Simmons is very, very happy that he’s not in Tucker’s place right now. Even though he deserves to be, considering that _ failure-- _

“Later,” York whispers, and Simmons is embarrassed. He’d been thinking  _ that _ loudly, apparently.  _ Get it together.  _

“Report in my office.”

“Yes, sir!” 

The Director’s green eyes flick over to York and Simmons. Simmons tries to think quiet thoughts. 

“Agent York, you’ll report tomorrow.”

Simmons feels a wave of relief from York. He realizes that York is exhausted, his sleep interrupted and his body aching with various pains that Simmons didn’t have the power or ability to completely cure. The adrenaline crash is coming. 

Simmons is relieved as well. He’ll be able to frame their report better, come up with all sorts of responses to possible inquiries the Director might make. (Even if he never seems to be able to come up with quite enough of them.) 

“Yes, sir,” he says, and then they abandon Wash to his fate, whatever it may be. A harsh tongue lashing, a drop in ranking, and who knew what else. 

_ <York,> _ he says, and doesn’t really know how to proceed. An apology? He’s not…  _ super _ used to apologies. Because he’s usually right, not because he’s a shit apologizer…

“Everyone fucks up on missions,” he says firmly. His voice lowers. “Like with me and that lock… All locks, really.” 

_ <You’re great at locks!> _ Simmons hotly denies immediately, because he _ is,  _ but he also gets what York means. Because he also kind of sucks at locks at the same time. 

“Right,” York agrees, and seriously, fuck,  _ quiet thoughts, _ Simmons. “You suck, Simmons.” 

<What!?> he says, maybe a little louder than normal but it’s not a shriek because AIs can’t shriek, that’s dumb. 

York winces, and rubs a little at one ear like what he’d just heard wasn’t entirely mental. “What I’m  _ getting _ at,” he says, “is that you suck--”

_ <Yeah, thanks I got it, asshole--> _

_ “--but,” _ he continues in exasperation, “you also rock, at the same time.” 

Simmons spends a moment trying to figure out how to react to being insulted and complimented at the same time, waffling between offense and flattery, which aren’t very compatible emotions. By the time he starts leaning towards offense, which is his tendency, York’s knocking on a door that he belatedly realizes is North’s. And Grif’s. 

_ <York,> _ Simmons says, thoroughly distracted.  _ <York, what are you doing.> _

“What you asked me to do?” he says, faux innocently, like he isn’t being a little shit. 

Simmons most definitely doesn’t remember asking him to drag his defeated carcass to North and Grif’s door at who-fucking-knew-o'clock, but North is opening the door and it’s too late now. 

North is wearing purple pajamas. Simmons doesn’t know whether to be mortified or to not give a damn that he’s clearly woken him up. It’d be easier not to care if he had an  _ excuse.  _

North blinks at them a little sluggishly, a little groggy. “Is something wrong?” 

“No,” York says. “Sorry, I didn’t know what time it is. Can I… uh, okay this is a really weird request, but. Can we… sleep together?” 

North blinks rapidly at that, caught of guard, waking up. “What?” 

“I’m tired as fuck,” he says. “Mission fucked with my night. I’ll tell you all about it in the morning, ‘s kind of hilarious to be honest.” 

North gives him a close look. “Can’t sleep?” A twitch of his lip. “Carolina kick you out?” 

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re implying,” he says flatly. “But nah. Simmons thinks that I’m shitty at multitasking. I can hang out with you and sleep at the same time, apparently.” 

Oh. That. Simmons thinks he’s starting to see what York thought was so weird about that suggestion, faced with the sheer awkwardness that is York waking up North who knows when to take a nap with him. 

North raises his eyebrows at that. “Is that so?” 

He shrugs. “It’ll make Grif and Simmons happy. They can get to connect wirelessly and be chatterboxes at each other for a while.” 

_ <Don’t put words in my mouth!> _ Simmons yelps. 

North winces like someone had just shouted into his ear. Simmons checks to see if he’d projected that exclamation. He hadn’t. 

York gives him a wry, sympathetic look. “They doth protest a whole bunch, eh?” 

North snorts. “Yeah.” And then he looks inside his room thoughtfully. “Ah, screw it. I was planning on sleeping in today for Grif anyways, since I got to wake up early yesterday.” 

And then he snags a hand around York’s arm and pulls him inside. 

“If Carolina sees you leaving my room, you’re explaining.” 

“You drive a hard bargain, North. Deal.” 

Simmons really, really wishes right now, out of spite if nothing else, that he could hide how happy he is from York. 


	19. weird dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “We’re going to survive,” Simmons says stubbornly. “And I’m going to get a medal.”
> 
> “Not me?” he asks.
> 
> “What the hell would you get a medal for? Eating more rations than allowed?”

The weather’s hot and muggy, the insects of the forest making an absolute racket. He’s used to sleeping in warm weather, though. What’s keeping him up is Simmons’ tossing and turning. 

“Let me sleep,” he groans quietly so he won’t wake up the rest of the squad. Tucker never lets his beauty sleep being interrupted go, and Sarge will give him the bitching of a lifetime for interrupting  _ Caboose’s _ beauty sleep. ‘

“How could you even sleep at all in this place?” Simmons whispers at him frustratedly, surrounded by their sleeping squadmates. “The bugs are  _ so loud _ and the ground is so hard and also _ moist _ at the same time and it  _ smells  _ and what if an animal attacks us?” 

“We have guns,” he reminds him. 

“What if other people with guns attack us?” 

“We die,” he says, having actually thought about that exact thing happening very, very much, considering that their whole job is to run at people with guns who want to kill them. He’s confident in his answer. 

_ “How could you say that?” _ Simmons demands, strangled and high pitched as he tries to clamp down on the angry-fearful shriek that wants to come out instead. 

He rolls onto his side and reluctantly opens his eyes. It’s dark, no light besides the stars and moons for miles, and the trees up ahead cover most of it. But the paleness of Simmons’ worried face stands out starkly in the night. His brow is furrowed and his mouth is pinched and his eyes are on him and he can’t see his freckles in this lighting. 

“We’re in a warzone,” he says. “What did you think was going to happen?” 

“We’re going to survive,” Simmons says stubbornly. “And I’m going to get a medal.” 

“Not me?” he asks. 

“What the hell would you get a medal for? Eating more rations than allowed?” 

“But I do get to survive.” 

“... We’re  _ all  _ going to survive,” Simmons says, still stubborn but more quiet. He hates being openly mushy. 

He smiles slightly, lips closed. So long as he doesn’t show his teeth Simmons probably won’t notice it. 

He closes his eyes and soaks in Simmons’ forced certainty. Indulges it for a moment. They’re going to live. Of course they’re going to live, there’s no question about it. Him and Simmons and Sarge and Donut and Caboose and Tucker, all of them. They’re going to live and they’re going to get to leave, to go home, to stop worrying about guns and armor and sleeping uncomfortable places half convinced that they’re not going to wake up at all in the morning. He’ll see his sister again. Maybe Simmons can visit. Or they can call each other. They’ll live. 

He doesn’t like the double edged sword of false hope, but it’s a nice fantasy to help him fall asleep. 

Simmons tosses and turns restlessly. He sighs and opens his eyes again. 

“If you’re so worried then come over here,” he says. “You can use me as a meatshield. Just let me sleep.” 

There’s a brief silence, and then Simmons is shuffling in closer to him, armor pressing up against armor, and he imagines what if they  _ weren't _ wearing armor, and they were instead in his bed back home. 

Sounds like heaven and false hopes. 

There could be people with guns in the bushes who want to kill them, so he boldly tosses his arm around Simmons’ side. Simmons doesn’t say anything as he breathes on the top of his head. 

Simmons falls asleep, and North eventually follows. 

 

North slowly blinks himself awake, feeling vaguely disoriented. There’s a warm body in his arms but the temperature is comfortable. He’s never been deployed somewhere tropical in his life. Only cold outposts. He’s on a bed, not the hard ground. His bed. On the MOI. 

He blinks himself more awake, and leans back to get a good look a the body in his arms. It’s  _ York.  _ He stares, and for a long moment nothing makes any sense at all. 

York, smiling sheepishly and asking to sleep with him and it taking just a bit too long for him to realize what he was actually asking. Simmons complaining to Grif for hours about how irresponsible York is, how stupid Wash and Tucker are, and Grif humming and listening and turning the conversation down a million pointless digressions on the way. The soft orange-maroon glow of them sensed faintly through his closed eyelids. Falling asleep like that. 

He twists and squints at his alarm clock. Right, right, he’d decided to sleep in late today for Grif. He falls back into his bed. 

“... Had a weird dream,” he says, and then his brow furrows as he tries to remember it. He was talking to Simmons, except Simmons was a human, and he was upset about something. Simmons is usually upset about something. 

_ <I know,> _ Grif says.  _ <I was there.> _

Dreaming has gotten much stranger since he’s gotten an AI. 

“Do you remember more of it than I do?” he asks. 

_ <We… were cuddling?> _ He feels embarrassed. 

“So we were,” he says as the memory of dream Simmons pressed close up against him unlocks itself.  _ Weird.  _

Despite the half audible conversation, York is still fast asleep. He must be exhausted. North doesn’t want to wake him. 

“It’s not _ that _ late,” he says. “Let’s go back to sleep.” 

_ <Hell yes dude.> _

North makes himself comfortable again. Something hard is digging into his ribs. He frowns and digs it out and holds it up to his face. 

It’s a bloody bullet. 

North stares at it, and then at York, and then at the brand new still red but already closed gunshot wound on his shoulder. 

_ <... I think Simmons did some work while York was asleep.> _

“Yeah, so, I don’t want to think about that,” he says, puts the bullet on his nightstand, and closes his eyes. 

Rolls back towards York and tosses his arm over his side without thinking about it. Falls back asleep. 


	20. too easy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He opens the door right into Carolina’s face.
> 
> “Uh,” he says. The door whooshes shut behind him. “This isn’t what it looks like.”

York wakes up slowly and comfortably. It’s warm and soft where he is, and Carolina’s got an arm around him-- wait. That arm isn’t buff enough to be Carolina’s. He opens his eyes to see North’s very, very pale sleep slack face, drooling slightly into his pillow. Blinks his one functioning (strange feeling, the wrong color) eye rapidly. 

_ <Remember?> _ Simmons says after shoving last night memories to the forefront of his mind. He grimaces and squeezes his eye shut at the feeling. Kind of like brain freeze, brief thought stopping pain.  _ <Sorry!> _

“S’fine,” he says, the pain already slipping away. At least he’s thoroughly awake now. He stretches slowly where he lies, feeling out the aches and pains in his muscles. The gunshot wound just feels like deep bruising, there’s no burning ache from where he overtaxed himself or threw himself onto the ground from a plane yesterday. Simmons must have been hard at work all night. He focuses on fondness, appreciation. 

Simmons gives off a sensation like pleased embarrassed squirming in his mind, but not anything else. Maybe non verbal praise is the way to go with him. 

His stomach rumbles. 

_ <You need calories,> _ Simmons says. 

“I need  _ bacon,”  _ he says, and reaches out towards North.

_ <Let him sleep,> _ Simmons says hurriedly. York’s hand stills.  _ <It’s fine. It won’t hurt. Nothing’s happening.> _

York smiles. “Sap.” 

_ <I am _ not-->

“Simmons and Grif, sitting in a tree--”

_ <STOP THAT,> _

“K-I-S--”

_ <You know what I change my mind wake them up wake them up right now  _ push them out of the bed.>

“Nope,” York says. “You’re right, let’s leave them.” 

And so York with painful slowness creeps out of the bed without waking up North. He feels like a frat boy escaping his one night stand, except that he’d never minded sleeping in with them. Getting dressed takes a while, picking out his armor pieces from North’s in the dark. He ends up not finding his helmet. Whatever, it can wait. Bacon time. 

He glances at them over his shoulder before he leaves. Still fast asleep. Success. 

A wave of warmth from Simmons, and he grins and turns around to leave before Simmons notices him noticing and gets all bent out of shape about it. 

He opens the door right into Carolina’s face. 

“Uh,” he says. The door whooshes shut behind him. “This isn’t what it looks like.” 

Carolina looks at him. He can’t decipher her expression because of her helmet. 

“Really,” he says, “it really really isn’t what it looks like! Simmons?” 

Carolina looks at him. 

Simmons is frozen like a deer in headlights inside of his mind, which is massively unhelpful both in terms of assistance and York’s composure. He keeps finding himself wanting to freeze along with him. 

Carolina reaches out towards his face. It doesn’t even occur to York to try and dodge it. The kevlar of her glove feels familiar on the skin of his face. She rubs her thumb underneath his eye-- his new eye. Oh. 

“You’re okay,” she says. 

“Hadn’t you heard?” he asks. 

“I was working.” 

More than necessary, and avoiding everyone while she was at it to boot, he bets. When Carolina worries, she focuses on work. (When she’s angry, she focuses on work. When she’s sad, she focuses on work. When she’s  _ happy, _ she focuses on work.) 

“Well, I’m fine,” he says, and feels dry mouthed as she strokes her hand down his jawline, still looking at him intently. The inside of the kevlar suits are covered in a softer material so they don’t die of overheating and friction inside of them, but-- this feels nice. He leans into her hand, into her touch. He’s missed her. 

“So you are,” she says, voice strange and distant. 

“I wasn’t uh, by the way, with North.” 

“I don’t think you were cheating on me with North, York,” she says, subtle traces of amusement starting to bleed into her voice. On the rare occasions he gets her for himself for a whole night or afternoon he can reliably foster those traces until there’s an undertone of laughter to everything she says. His best achievement. 

York’s room is two doors down from North’s, and he’s got her pulled along almost all the way there before she realizes, and stops. She is as immovable as a pillar. 

“York,” she says, “what are you doing?” 

“Well,” he says, “I’m off sick leave. And you just got a whole lot of working out of your system, right? Enough to maybe fool around with me for a few hours?” He gives her his most charming smile and sways into her space. “Come on. It’s been ages.” 

His body is aching, and he’s still starving, but he’s pretty sure there are some snacks somewhere in his room and he can’t just let an opportunity like this go. His muscles will _ handle  _ it. 

_ “York,”  _ she says, exasperated, “haven’t you forgotten something?” 

Forgotten something? He blinks, thinks about it. Can’t think of anything that oughta stop them from doing this. Think, thinks, and this is normally where Simmons would help him out by pointing out the relevant memory for him-- 

“Ohhh!” he says, rocking back on his heels. He hadn’t even-- thought about that! Simmons hasn’t said anything since he ran into Carolina, he realizes. 

“Yes,” Carolina says dryly. “Oh.” 

“Simmons?” York asks. 

Simmons doesn’t say anything. Or feel anything. 

“Oh my god,” he says, “I think he logged himself off.” 

“Wait, what? They can  _ do _ that?” Carolina sounds scandalized and shocked at this revelation. 

“Uh, yeah, but he doesn’t like it because it feels kinda weird and scary and-- Jesus Christ, when did he--?” 

“All of this time, and they can just  _ log off?” _ Carolina goes on. 

“Probably when you started caressing my face, now that I think about it.” That seems like the kind of thing that would make Simmons immediately explode into panic and then do something impulsive. 

Carolina freezes. York freezes a fraction of a second after her, takes a step back from her until they’re not standing at such an intimate distance, glances around the hallway they’re standing in in a hopefully not shifty or guilty way. They’re alone. Then why had she--? 

“Caboose. Stop. Talking.” Carolina’s hands are balled up into fists. 

“... Carolina?” he asks. “Everything okay?” 

“Yes. Yeah. I-- I’m sorry I touched you.” 

_ “What?” _ he asks, suddenly not understanding anything at all. 

“Your face. I shouldn’t, it’s a bad fucking idea. Right after you finally got better, too. I didn’t think.”  

“Carolina,” he says, and his voice comes out soft with shock. “No. It’s fine.” 

“It isn’t fine,” she says with harsh abrupt vitriol. “I hurt you, York, I really hurt you--”

“--But I’m fine now--”

“--and I could hurt you again--”

“--and you apologized and it’s okay--”

“--and I crushed a gun in my hand on my last mission without meaning to and  _ Caboose will you SHUT UP!?”  _

York’s mouth clacks shut. Carolina breathes harshly. 

He wishes he could see her face. He wishes Simmons was online. He doesn’t know what to say except ‘no I’m fine it’s fine everything’s fine you don’t have to be sorry or scared I love you’. He wants to say just that, except she wouldn’t listen to it. Would shout over it or ignore it or disagree with it entirely. It’s too easy for her to accept. 

“Wear your damn helmet,” she says, and walks away. 


	21. how South (and North) joins

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is how South (and North) joins Project Freelancer:

This is how South (and North) joins Project Freelancer: 

_  
It wasn’t her fault.  _ She doesn’t get into fights at the drop of hat like she had back as a furious teenager who barely bothered to control herself. She’s in the army now, where you can be dishonorably discharged and shit like that. She can grit her teeth and bear it when someone’s being a stupid fucking asshole around her. Curl her hands into white knuckled fists and hiss scathing insults at them instead until they’re put off enough that they shut up and leave or get pissed enough that they hit her first, at which point she’ll only be punished and not discharged for fighting back. She’s got her temper under control, more or less. She’s fine. She’s doing fine. 

Her brother’s doing more than fine. He’s doing  _ great. _ The squad loves him. He’s fun to talk to, easy to be with, knows how to take a joke, pleasant and mild and always in a good mood. He’s got friends. He’s popular, as always, in that unassuming casual way people who aren’t popular because of their looks or their hilarious sense of humor or bank account are; he’s just universally _ liked. _ Not adored, or worshipped, or catered to. But always met with smiles. 

She’s met with eyerolls and grimaces, even though she hasn’t  _ started _ a fight since she joined the military. 

Whatever. She’s not going to paste on a smile and scrape and beg for affection. (It wouldn’t work, anyways. She’d start having the semblance of a friendship with someone, and then in a few days, weeks, months, it would all of a sudden explode in her face for no reason she could discern, violently and totally with angry screaming and tears. Over and over again, as reliable as a clock.) She already has a friend. She doesn’t need more than one. 

The one guy who goes out of his way to sit next to her during mealtime or partner up with her during exercises or patrol is named Pierce. He’s a sour man with an eternal bitch face, which she can relate to, and he mutters about how fucking stupid everyone is to her and has a snicker that makes his eyes squeeze shut and her stomach flop nervously. Having one, just  _ one  _ person, is helping her retain her sanity so damn much. Nice brothers don’t count. They feel obligated to hang out with you because they feel sorry for you because of how many friends they have and how many you don’t. Pity isn’t friendship. Family doesn’t count. 

“My brother’s so full of shit,” she mutters as she dismantles and cleans her gun, the actions sharp and jerky with her anger. 

“Ooh, what’s he done now,” Pierce says, not raising his gaze from his own gun. 

He’d walked up to to her and softly, tentatively, with slow cautiousness told her all earnest like that he wasn’t too sure about this Pierce guy, is what. One friend. She can’t have one friend without him finding some fault in them, without him urging her to ditch them. He doesn’t understand. He doesn’t  _ get it, _ because he’s naturally nice and liked and his relationships all go swimmingly smoothly well, no drama, no fights, no inexplicable implosions a few months down the line. She can’t afford to ditch someone just because they’re not perfect. If she wasn’t willing to take what she could get, she’d have  _ nothing. _ She’s not like him, and he doesn’t seem to realize it, and somehow that’s more infuriating than anything else. 

“Thinks you’re  _ enabling _ me, or whatever the fuck,” she scoffs. 

Pierce barks a short derisive laugh. “Now there’s a guy who doesn’t know how to mind his own damn business.” 

“Right?” she says. _ Pierce _ gets her. He’s angry and unimpressed with the world, like her. Not taken with it and pampered and naive. If her brother understood how bullshit life is, he’d be just as angry as her. Only idiots are happy. 

“Enabling. What does that even mean? What, I can’t agree with you about stuff? You can’t agree with me about stuff? We can’t talk about how shallow all of these transparent morons are?” 

She’s nodding along to everything he’s saying, and her eyes dart up to take in her squadmates that are out of earshot. Smiling and laughing and punching each other in the shoulder.  _ (Smiling and laughing at  _ you, a voice in the back of her mind says.) Shallow morons is right. They don’t understand anything, except for how to make friends and keep them, a lesson that was cruelly never taught just to her, it seems like. 

Her brother is sitting with a small group on the other side of the room, cleaning their weapons and grinning at each other. She feels slightly safe that at least that pocket isn’t laughing about her  _ (they know something you don’t, _ the voice says), because her brother gets a small sad frown on his face when people shit talk her at him, and people stop once they see it after some sheepish backpedaling. Everything comes easy to him. 

“He’s such a shit,” Pierce goes on. “Such a fucking liar, look at him. No way that’s the real him. No one’s  _ really _ that nice. You’d go crazy.” 

“Totally,” she says, even though he’s never once dropped the act around her in their entire lives together. It’s just so hard to believe that someone could live like that. What is the inside of his head even like? What could it be like to not be frustrated with absolutely everyone and everything? 

“Cozying up to everyone, making sure they like him. God, he’s obsessed. How vain and desperate can you get?” 

She and Pierce aren’t like that. Pierce accepts her in all her bitchy glory. He  _ likes _ that she’s a bitch. Says it makes her real. No one’s ever liked the mean angry part of her before, and it’s such a big part of her. 

“Yeah,” she agrees with him. 

“What’s  _ wrong _ with him,” Pierce marvels, on a roll now. “Does he get off on it? Being liked?” He laughs, like something just occurred to him. “Maybe he’s a slut. Maybe that’s why everyone likes him so much. He secretly sucks all of their cocks.” He snickers that belly flopping laugh, eyes closing with his amusement. 

For some reason, her stomach is still and she doesn’t laugh along with him. 

“Oh my god,” he goes on. “This explains everything. He--” 

“Pierce,” she says. “Stop.” 

He looks at her with a curiosity that borders on offense. He’s never heard her say anything but negative shit about her brother. For some reason, the look makes a sensation not unlike dread start bubbling in her gut, but she ignores it. “Why?” he asks. 

“That’s my fucking brother,” she says. 

“Your prissy, annoying, condescending, busy body, probably a whore brother,” he says. 

She slams her gun down on the table in front of her, turns around to level a glare at him. She feels too hot, like she isn’t in control of her body. Can’t hear what she’s thinking over the roar of her blood in her ears. She might not be thinking at all. 

“He’s  _ family,” _ she snarls. Family doesn’t count as friendship, is hardly tolerable on a daily basis, but when it matters she can’t fucking stand the idea of him getting hurt and her not standing up for him. She can’t stand his presence for more than five minutes, but she’d kill for him. 

He rolls his eyes at her. He’s not supposed to do that, her one friend that’s keeping her sane. She’s losing control of the situation, like water or sand slipping through her fingers. 

“Fine,” he says.  _ “Okay.”  _

She turns back to her gun. 

“You’re being a real bitch,” he says, and for the first time it sounds like an insult instead of a compliment from him. 

This is also the first time she’s ever explicitly disagreed with him, she realizes. 

_ You’re not yourself when you’re with him,  _ her brother had said. 

She hates it when he’s right. She hates it so much that before she realizes it she’s got Pierce decked out on the floor, her knuckles aching with the punch she’d sent into his face. 

He swears and starts standing up, hand to his face, glaring fiercely at her, and she feels like the floor is falling out from underneath her feet, everything spiraling out of control. She thought she’d finally found a friend who wouldn’t turn on her out of nowhere a few months in.

She’d determined not to be a desperate pathetic smiling fake ever again, trying and failing to make friends by trying to play their game even though no one had ever taught her the inscrutable rules. But it had happened again, hadn’t it. Being someone’s yes man because she couldn’t handle how damn lonely she was (and family doesn’t count, that’s cheating, that’s pitiful). 

South roars, infuriated at being tricked into being someone’s henchman, and dives at him, and now they’re wrestling on the ground, grunting curses at each other as they grapple and try and hurt each other as much as they can. 

There’s a ring of people around them, a commotion. Back in high school, they’d just stand back and cheer and record it on their phones. Here, they forcibly tear her and Pierce apart. She throws herself against the hands holding her in place, eyes set on Pierce. 

“Woah!” her brother says, coming onto the scene. She wants to protectively stand in front of him and punch him in the gut at the same time. “What’s going on here?” 

“That crazy bitch just  _ jumped _ me,” Pierce says. 

She screams at him, wordless with pure fury. (And tears aren’t pricking at the back of her eyes, she isn’t upset, she isn’t betrayed, or devastated. She’s just angry.) 

This probably doesn’t do much to convince anyone that she isn’t a crazy bitch, but she’s been useless at maintaining a good reputation since kindergarten. There’s no point in caring about that bullshit. It’s hopeless. 

Her brother does the sad frown that sends people backpedaling. “Don’t call her that. Her name is--” 

“I don’t fucking care!” Pierce says. He’s never backpedaled a day in his life, and he doesn’t give a singular fuck about her brother. People aren’t holding  _ him  _ back. Men who he has shit talked on a daily basis with her pat his shoulders, sympathetic, and he straightens and puffs up underneath their silent support. “She needs to be  _ shot _ for what she did. She’s rabid.” 

There’s something cold and hollow opening up in her at his words. He wants her shot. They were friends ten minutes ago. Now he despises her. It happened again. How does it keep happening? What does she keep fucking up? What’s wrong with her, and why is she only one who can’t see it? 

Her brother goes still at Pierce’s words. Some of the men nod along, making agreeing noises. Glaring at her. 

“Davis,” her brother says, voice unreadable, expression unviewable from where she’s standing, addressing one of the men who nodded. One of the men who’d been grinning along with him only a short while ago. “You agree with him?” 

Davis has the grace to look guilty as soon as her brother turns his attention to him. No guilt just for her. She’d broken his nose last month, she recalls, over some argument she can’t remember the details of. She gets in so many arguments. 

“Sorry, dude,” he says, to  _ him, _ not to  _ her. _ “But you’ve gotta admit that she’s out of control, right?”

She feels breathless. The hands on her tight and many. She’d be able to beat them in a fair fight, so people always know to gang up on her if they want to win. It’s like high school again, her versus every boy in her grade all gathered up in small mobs, all feeling angry and vengeful for every time she’d beaten them when it was one on one. 

“Watts?” her brother says, sounding so distant. 

“She’s an animal,” Watts says apologetically. 

_ They don’t even think you’re a person, _ the voice whispers. 

“You all feel like this?” he says. 

There’s an awkward silence filled with her heavy breathing as she keeps frantically struggling against the hands holding her down. There’s a mindless sort of panic dawning on her, reminding her of that time as a child when she’d gone swimming in a river and been caught in the mini whirlpool caused by the waterfall, unable to swim away, kept being pulled down over and over again, surviving on small sips of air,  _ this is how you die _ the only thought she could think. She’d broken free eventually, but her brother had heard her scream before she had, and once she’d swam and collapsed onto the shore he’d been so worried he’d cried. She pretended to cut the swimming trip short and gone home for his sake and not hers. Held his hand just for him, supposedly. 

He turns around and looks at her. She’s bad at reading faces, but she’s used to his. It’s very blank, but she sees it. 

When he attacks the men holding her in place, it comes as a surprise to everyone but her. 

You can’t be friends with family, they don’t count, it isn’t possible. But family stands up for family when it matters. 

 

They didn’t  _ kill  _ anyone. They just kicked their asses, is all. Left them groaning and bleeding on the ground, the entire squad. They’re good, after all. The top two on the team. 

Well. Pierce-- 

Head injuries so easily turn into something serious. It was an accident. It doesn’t count. 

The Counselor, as the man had introduced himself, smiles at them. She doesn’t care. She’s bad at names anyways. More like she doesn’t try to be, but whatever. 

“You’d both be terribly punished for this,” he says. “Several of your teammates have permanent injuries and scarring, not to mention the unfortunate loss of Private Pierce.” 

She feels nothing at the name, because she doesn’t let herself think about it in the slightest. She doesn’t like to think too heavily about things. It never leads anywhere good. 

“I assume you’re telling us this because you want to cut us some sort of deal?” her brother says, voice mild even with the cuffs around his wrists. 

She hadn’t assumed that. She’d thought he was gloating at them, rubbing their inevitable death or incarceration in their faces. She’s annoyed when he nods confirmation. Her brother always has to be right. She always has to be wrong. It’s  _ grating. _

She’d felt so in tune with him while they’d fought together, but she’s already back to the usual level of dislike a few days later. She wishes she could stay in that place, with the blood and the unquestioned wonderful trust. 

“The two of you show promise,” he says. “I’d like for you to join a highly confidential project that requires skilled soldiers. I know it may not be ideal, but even if you were only to be imprisoned,” he nods at her brother, _ “she’s  _ definitely being executed. She killed a teammate.” 

Both of them look at him. Neither of them move or speak for a moment. And then her brother smiles his easy smile and says, “We’re listening.” 

She wasn’t the one who’d killed Pierce. Not that anyone would believe that. He’s so full of shit. 


	22. For science

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’m not going to apologize for making you not kill Carolina,” he says.

North corners South in a less used training room, because all it has is some weights and a punching bag. The punching bag has always been her favorite, though. She glances at him as he enters, and then grimaces, turns back to her punching, now pointedly twice as hard. 

“I’m not going to apologize for making you not kill Carolina,” he says. 

_ <Diplomatic,> _ Grif snipes. North can feel how uncomfortable he is, how much he doesn’t like this, forcing interactions were it isn’t wanted. But it’s been a long while now, and it doesn’t look like South is gonna calm down on her own. 

“I wasn’t gonna  _ kill  _ her,” South says, punching the bag with murderous intent. “Was gonna  _ beat _ her.” 

“You  _ did _ beat her. You had.” 

South frowns at the punching bag, punches it some more, and doesn’t say anything in response. North sighes quietly through his nose, already feeling himself getting tired. She’s exhausting. She’s impossible. She’s uncooperative. No matter how hard he tries, how inoffensive and nonconfrontational he is, he can’t make her happy. (Not that this is him at his most nonconfrontational.) 

_ She’s your sister, _ he reminds himself. 

“I just didn’t want for us to lose this too, if you accidentally went too far. If Carolina died…” 

South snorts. “Like that’s _ my _ move?” 

A pointed reference. North feels a frown start to crease his face, and he tamps down on it. He doesn’t feel bad about Pierce, anyways. He’d deserved it. 

Grif continues to be a ball of awkward discomfort in his head, pulled all together tightly, not touching as much as possible. Hopefully he didn’t catch any hints of anything, there. 

“It was an accident,” he lies. 

_ <What?> _ Grif says. 

_ Later, _ he thinks. 

South finally stops punching the bag, shakes her hands out. 

“South,” he says, and her shoulders goes up as she braces herself for whatever she thinks he’s about to say. “Want a drink?” 

“What?” she asks, and finally turns around to see him fully. He holds up the bottle of whiskey he brought and grins. 

“I haven’t gotten drunk yet since we’ve gotten the AIs,” he says. “Do you wanna try it out with me? For science, I swear.” 

He’d been planning, vaguely, to do it with York instead. York would agree easily, and contribute to the conversation, and laugh and crack jokes of his own, and Grif and Simmons would be pleased as clams to be together. But family is work and sacrifice. And it could work, couldn’t it? South gets warmer sometimes when she’s drunk. That, or more violent. It’s a bit of a coin toss, honestly. 

“You son of a bitch,” South says. “You had booze all of this time, and you  _ didn’t tell me?”  _

“I was saving it for a special occasion!” he defends himself, and smiles, because the conversation is almost starting to sound friendly. 

Donut flickers on next to South. “No wine?” he asks, disappointed. 

“How would you even know what wine tastes like?” South scoffs. 

“It just seems classier, is all,” he replies. 

With every word that isn’t oozing with hostility, Grif is slowly unwinding inside of him. North’s smiles come more easily to him as the second hand tension dissipates. 

“Drinking game?” he proposes as he approaches her. 

She rolls her eyes, but nods. 

“Ooh,” Donut says, clearly enthusiastic. “What kind?” 

Grif flickers on as well. “Never have I ever?” he suggests. 

“Sounds good,” North says, and sits down on a bench, patting the place next to him while looking at South. 

“Never have I ever murdered a teammate,” she snipes automatically. 

North looks at her for a moment, and then he takes a drink from the bottle without breaking eye contact. 

“He tried to kill South first,” he explains to Grif after he’s finished. 

“Oh,” Grif says, and accepts the explanation. He can feel it, the reasoning sinking in to the core of him like a stone dropped into a pond with no ripples, no lingering mixed feelings whatsoever. It might be because of how much time he’s spent in North’s mind, but Grif gets family. North appreciates it. “That’s fine, then.” 

When he looks away from the orange holo to South, her face has softened. It’s a rare expression, just the absence of tension or anger. She looks younger, her mouth and her brow relaxed. He wishes he knew exactly what to do and say to keep her looking like that. 

She looks away. “I’d never thought of it that way.” 

“The golden rule. If you want to be treated nicely, treat people nicely. If you don’t want to be killed by a teammate, don’t try to kill a teammate.” 

“I don’t think that that’s what our kindergarten teacher had in mind when she taught us that.” She walks closer and sits next to him. North feels the hidden triumph of someone who after much coaxing has finally gotten a nervous and temperamental stray cat to approach them. 

“The logic holds up, doesn’t it?” 

“You’re a fucking weirdo,” she tells him, an old refrain. 

“Never have I ever chaired a classmate  _ in front of _ my teacher.” 

Donut laughs, surprised. 

“Notice how he emphasised how he’s never chaired someone in front of  _ witnesses?”  _ South demands, and then grabs the bottle out of his hand and takes a greedy swig. “I am not the shitty twin. I’m the twin who doesn’t bother to fucking lie about it. And that bitch deserved it, she thought that just because she was a bitch to me near the teacher that she was safe.” 

“And of course you had to prove her wrong.” 

“Well what else was I gonna do, let her think that she was right?!” 

“You nearly got expelled!” 

“I nearly got expelled once a week, what’s the big deal.” 

“You gave our poor parents gray hairs far before their time.” 

“Nosy assholes. Never have I ever stolen the bunsen burner from school.” 

“I was _ borrowing _ it.” 

“Without permission. That’s stealing.” 

Grif finally relaxes enough to start enjoying himself, and soon he’s tossing out  _ never have I’s _ along with Donut. Being incredibly young and inexperienced AIs, they get their hosts drunk pretty fast. Shockingly, Donut’s the most inventive one out of all of them. 

Eventually, South tosses an arm around his shoulders, her breath reeking of booze in his face and her laugh loud and sharp in his ears. So it’s warm drunk South today. Grinning, he tucks an arm around her waist and determines to finish the bottle with her. He has to enjoy this while it lasts. 


	23. A lil moonshine never hurt anyone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tucker, such a charming glowing shade of turquoise, he’d look so nice with some glitter to go with it, leans in. “Donut?” he asks. “You in there? Yo, pop out! We need for you tell us whether or not South is concussed.”
> 
> “Ugh, nevermind,” Wash says. “I can smell it now. She’s definitely drunk.”

Donut and South just  _ trounced _ North and Grif in a drinking game, leaving them snoozing behind in the training room. Now they’re dizzily making their way… somewhere. A direction that is definitely a place. Yes. 

It is by turns hysterical, like the giggly mania you feel when it’s four in the morning and you’re in an airport and every little thing sends you into tearful peals of obnoxious laughter, or absolutely unbearable, like when you’re in the car and dad decided to take the car up the mountains because it’s a shortcut even though there’s a  _ million _ swings and you feel hot and clammy and like you’re dying of plague. Donut groans and presses his forehead against a cool metal wall like it’s the car window pane. South doesn’t move away from it as she continues to walk forward, so it’s like she’s leaning on it for support. 

“South?” a voice asks. Donut looks. It’s Wash. He smiles and waves at him, a dainty little waggle of the fingers. 

“Uh… is she, like,  _ okay?” _ Tucker asks Wash. 

“Ummmmm,” Wash says, high pitched. 

“You sound like a squeaky dog toy,” South says. Donut bursts out into laughter. 

“Aw come on,” Wash says. 

“God, she’s right on,” Tucker says in between snickers. 

“On  _ fleek,” _ Donut says, nonsensically. 

“Are you drunk?” Wash asks, approaching. 

“A lil moonshine never hurt anyone,” he says. “Doesn’t count. It’s not like  _ heroin _ or anything. My friend was driving.” 

“I was not,” South says. 

Tucker, such a charming glowing shade of turquoise, he’d look so nice with some glitter to go with it, leans in. “Donut?” he asks. “You in there? Yo, pop out! We need for you tell us whether or not South is concussed.” 

“Ugh, nevermind,” Wash says. “I can smell it now. She’s definitely drunk.” 

“Were you invited to a party?” Tucker asks. “Was there a party that we weren’t invited to?” 

“Tucker, this isn’t college. There aren’t secret frat parties.” 

“You look me in the eye and tell me the Director isn’t the surly buzzkill dean.” 

Wash tentatively takes one of South’s arms and drapes it over his shoulders, like he’s afraid that she’s gonna take the opportunity to put him in chokehold or something. She belligerently abruptly leans all of her weight on him. He  _ oofs, _ buckles, but rallies and straightens. 

“Wuss,” South says. 

Donut smiles and lets his head loll, inhales through his nose. “You smell so good,” he compliments him. “What shampoo is that?” 

“Uh. I? Forgot my shampoo? So Florida lent me his. He scrubbed it in for me, actually. It was. Absolutely terrifying.” 

She cackles at him. 

“I’m so confused,” Wash groans. 

“Dude, I’ve heard about this,” Tucker loudly whispers to Wash. “It’s the hot and cold treatment. She’s keeping you on your toes! She’s  _ flirting.”  _

“Tucker! She’s  _ drunk!”  _

“I’m not saying take advantage of it! I’m just  _ saying--”  _

“Oh my god.” 

“--that maybe next time  _ she’s _ sober and  _ you’re _ sober--”

“Tucker, stop.” 

“--you lay the  _ moves _ on her because now you know she wants it!” 

Wash doesn’t say anything. 

“Bowchickabowwow,” Tucker says. 

“You don’t get to do that if you don’t do a pun first,” Wash says. 

“Your eyes are so pretty,” Donut says. They are. 

“I’m gonna puke,” South says. And then she does. It’s  _ awful.  _


	24. fine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “How have you and Tucker been getting along?” the Counselor asks.
> 
> “Fine,” Wash says, and then looks back at the camera pointed in his direction again, distracted. “Why are you recording this, again?”

Tucker feels sick and angry. 

“How have you and Tucker been getting along?” the Counselor asks. 

“Fine,” Wash says, and then looks back at the camera pointed in his direction again, distracted. “Why are you recording this, again?” 

“Just for my own notes, David.” 

“Wash is fine.” 

Tucker feels Wash bite his own tongue on saying anything further, memories of old therapists and counselors from back before he joined the army rising to his mind, just looking at him and listening to him, no cameras in sight. A slight sense of unease. A drop in the ocean that is  _ Tucker’s _ unease. 

“What is he like?” the Counselor asks. 

Wash looks away from the camera. “Tucker?” 

“Yes.” 

Normally, Tucker would be full of interest at the idea of Wash trying to describe him in words, would be preening or egging him on for compliments. He doesn’t like the idea of the Counselor knowing a single thing about him. 

“He’s… fine,” Wash says. “I like him.” 

“I’ve been thinking about perhaps laying down some rules in these sessions. Forbidding certain words used for evasion. Such as ‘fine’.” 

“Does everyone have to go to these sessions?” he asks, evading. 

“Yes. Everyone with an AI. It is vital to keep track of your mental states to see if there are any negative developments. Nothing quite like this has ever been done before. Project Freelancer’s AIs are something unique, as is their implementation and degree of control over their hosts.” 

“Uhhhh,” Wash says. “I wouldn’t say he’s got any kind of  _ control _ over me. We just… see a lot of each other.” 

“Mhmm,” the Counselor says, inscrutable. Tucker feels a sharp spark of annoyance that makes Wash grip the armrest tightly. “Would you bring him out?” 

“... Tucker?” he asks, like he’s hoping that the Counselor will say  _ no of course not don’t be silly.  _

“Who else?” 

Tucker  _ does not _ want to come out. Unless it’s to attack the Counselor. Does he get to attack the Counselor? 

“I thought these sessions were to check on  _ my _ mental state?” Wash tries. 

“As you said, you and Tucker see a lot of each other. I think it would be helpful for me to get to talk to him.” 

He doesn’t want to be here, talking to this man, in front of this man, being seen by this man,  _ go away-- _

“So!” Wash says. “You asked what Tucker’s like? Sorry I just kinda brushed over that, ha, woops. He’s, um… a jokester? Not very serious, most of the time, which is fi-- uh, okay. Casual, friendly, interested in… stuff you wouldn’t think an AI would be interested in. Kind of braggy, no offense, Tucker.”

He isn’t even listening. He’s looking at the Counselor, who’s looking at him, straight through Wash’s armor and skin and blood and meat like they’re no kind of obstacle. He isn’t blinking. 

_ <Creep,> _ he seethes, feeling furiously terrified. 

“That’s interesting,” the Counselor says. “That’s good to know. Any other developments you’d like to inform me about?” 

Tucker feels Wash think about the lost time, the moments of disorienting darkness lost to strange non-memories that can’t be real. Skin too dark, hair too long, height too short, feelings too insecure, wrong family, wrong friends, wrong missions. Something is wrong, wires crossed and misfiring, making up fake things that can distract them at any vital moment. So far it’s only happened while training, eating, trying to sleep, shower, brush his teeth. Slowly blinking awake to his own face in the mirror that doesn’t feel entirely right for just a moment. It’s a dangerous situation, a pitfall waiting for the worst possible moment to get them killed. 

_ <Tell him nothing,> _ he says, desperate. The Counselor can’t know anything. Never, ever. He isn’t safe. 

“I think Caboose and Tucker like each other a lot,” he says, lips numb. 

The Counselor smiles. Tucker wants to shut himself off. Telling him anything about Caboose feels somehow worse than anything yet. 

“Fascinating,” he says with utter sincerity. 

 

“Why do you hate the Counselor so much?” Wash asks later, when they’re alone and trying to recover from the absurdly stressful session in which everyone was very civil and polite to each other. 

“I don’t know,” he says, and it’s the truth. “Dude just creeps me the fuck out.” 

His hologram, projecting from Wash’s helmet that’s lying on his night table, is the bedroom’s only illumination. It’s a soft, teal light. Tucker would tease him for using him as a night light if he didn’t feel like hot fucking garbage. 

“Maybe it’s something they programmed into you,” he muses. “But why would they do that? Making you afraid of someone we’re supposed to listen to. Is it meant to make you more obedient? Did they do it to all of the other AIs too? Should we ask Caboose--” 

The idea of the Counselor and Caboose intersecting in  _ any _ way temporarily overwhelms him with irrationally strong feelings.  _ Bad  _ feelings. 

He’s still inside Wash’s neck implants. He just gets to connect to his armor wirelessly. Wash accidentally bites his own tongue mid sentence at the storm of emotions, and silently rides it out, stunned. 

“Sorry,” Tucker eventually says. “But no. No.” 

“Okay,” he says, and that’s that. End of discussion, no more poking or prodding or pushing. 

Wash is an awkward clumsy dork who’s loyal to total creeps, but Tucker thinks he might like him too. 


	25. Like falling asleep

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carolina doesn’t always have the safety on her gun off. Not when she isn’t on a mission, not when she isn’t facing an enemy, not when she doesn’t think she’ll be seeing action, not when she thinks she won’t be needing it. That would be stupid, unprofessional, and unsafe.
> 
> Caboose is always on, running in the background of her mind, taking up precious attention and patience, and turning her into a walking barely controlled wrecking ball.
> 
> There’s something illogical about that, now that she thinks about it.

Carolina doesn’t always have the safety on her gun off. Not when she isn’t on a mission, not when she isn’t facing an enemy, not when she doesn’t think she’ll be seeing action, not when she thinks she won’t be needing it. That would be stupid, unprofessional, and unsafe. 

Caboose is always on, running in the background of her mind, taking up precious attention and patience, and turning her into a walking barely controlled wrecking ball. 

There’s something illogical about that, now that she thinks about it. 

“Caboose,” she says while steadily doing pushups. 

After a long irritating pause, she feels him come to bright and eager attention, as if she could have possibly been talking to someone else. 

_ <Yes?> _ he asks. 

“How do I log you off?” 

Another long irritating pause. She keeps smoothly pushing herself up and down. This isn’t wasted time. She’s working out. Don’t get frustrated. Yelling at him will just make him shut up entirely, which is fine most of the time, but not when she needs an actual answer. 

_ <What?> _ he asks with perfectly sincere bafflement. She grinds her teeth for a moment, before consciously stopping. Her health is perfect, her diet and regimen flawless, but every time she visits a dentist they have a worried furrow between their brows. She has to have perfect control over herself. 

“Log off,” she repeats herself. She’s never had to repeat herself so often in her entire life before. “Make you go away. Go quiet.” 

_ <... Like falling asleep?> _

“Yes,” she says, seizing on the explanation. “How do I make you fall asleep?” 

_ <Well, I don’t like sleeping somewhere completely dark because that’s scary because the darkness is so big and it won’t talk back to you! So, uh, a nightlight helps. And um, someone to hug at night is good? Either someone so hard or so soft that I can’t break them, like a switchboard or a teddy bear. And you could read a story for me--> _

“Caboose!” she snaps. “You’re not a person. You can’t hug something while you sleep. And I’m  _ not _ getting you a nightlight and I’m  _ not  _ reading you a bedtime story. Simmons didn’t need any of that. He just turned himself off. You should be able to do that too.” 

_ <Ummm,> _ Caboose says, anxiously confused.  _ <I don’t know. Lots of people sleep different, Agent Carolina. Some sleep on their sides and some sleep on their bellies and others sleep on their backs like corpses and others toss and turn and others steal all of the covers like big meanies and others stretch out and take up all of the bed and others curl up into a ball and others kick you and others hug you and others sleep very little and so everyone is different and I don’t know how to be like someone who is different. I don’t think that’s how it works.> _

She lets herself grind her teeth. 

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but stop thinking,” she says. “Just stop all thinking entirely. No thoughts. See if that does anything.” 

There’s a long moment of silence. She doesn’t let herself get her hopes up. “Caboose?” 

_ <Yes?> _

“Damn it! You weren’t supposed to be thinking!” 

_ <I wasn’t! Except for thinking about not thinking… and Sheila… and stupid Tucker… and how I want to draw… Agent Carolina, can we draw? We could ask the quartermaster for some crayons--> _

“Shut. Down. Stop being you. Stop being here. I don’t need you right now. I’m not fighting. Go away.” She doesn’t know how to put it in simpler terms. 

Another long moment of silence. 

“Caboose?” she tries. 

No answer. Her head feels dead and empty and quiet. 

After a while, she moves onto lifting weights, feeling weightless and off kilter, like being hyper aware of the lost weight of a drastic haircut. She’ll adjust. She’ll be fine. 

This is better. 


	26. sweet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _  
>  <Please, I’m BEGGING for you to go off your diet.>   
>  _
> 
> “Every Freelancer’s on a diet, Grif,” he says. “We’re on a strict meal plan.”
> 
> _ <YES AND IT’S _ SICK.>

After the night of drinking together, South and North seem to be back together on their regular status quo, which is occupying completely different social circles as much as possible while still living in the same relatively small space and drawing from the same relatively small pool of people as each other. Home, highschool, basic, UNSC, MOI, and PFL. Story of their lives. 

They trade short greetings or nods when they pass each other, bicker on missions, and don’t get into huge arguments. This is what being on good terms with his sister has always been like for him. Sometimes, they’d fight. Even more rarely, as in perhaps once or twice a year, they’d have several enjoyable hours with each other at a stretch. That was last night. It’s over now. 

North can feel Grif not liking it. 

_ <It doesn’t feel right,> _ he says. _ <I don’t like it when she’s mad at m-- us-- I mean you.> _

“She’s not really mad at me right now, Grif,” he says. “This is us on our good days.” 

_ <It doesn’t feel right,> _ he repeats, and then he swiftly moves on to whine about how awful the food is here.  _ <Please, I’m BEGGING for you to go off your diet.> _

“Every Freelancer’s on a diet, Grif,” he says. “We’re on a strict meal plan.”

_ <YES AND IT’S _ SICK.>

“Can’t you just, I don’t know, block my tastebuds or something?”

_ <Maybe? But not without blocking them out for you too, and I’m not just sick of tasting kale! I want something actually good! Come on man, it won’t _ kill _ you to eat a cookie or something-- > _

Maine sits down with a clunk across from North. North smiles at him over his sandwich. They don’t really talk (Maine doesn’t really talk in  _ general), _ but he’s currently the only other person in the cafeteria, so it’s not strange for Maine to sit down with him. 

“Morning,” he greets. 

Maine grunts in reply and digs in to his food. 

Grif abruptly starts projecting himself. He points at Maine’s tray. “What. Is. That.” 

Maine, his mouth full, looks down at the tray. “Food,” he says. 

“It’s deep fried,” North remarks. 

“Deep fried,” Grif repeats, drawing out the words. “I want it.” 

“Where did you even get deep fried food, Maine?” North asks. It’s certainly not on their meal plan. “Is-- is that a slice of cake for dessert?” 

_ “Cake,” _ Grif says.  _ “Dessert.”  _

“Took it,” Maine says. 

“From where?” North asks. Honestly, getting information out of Maine is like pulling teeth out, sometimes. 

“I inherently trust and desire this food,” Grif says. 

“From some egghead,” Maine says. 

“I think it’s in my code,” Grif says. 

“Egg-- Maine, did you beat up one of the scientists for their lunch!?” 

“Didn’t beat him up. Asked for it. We traded.” 

North imagines Maine, gigantic, muscular, scarred, his face a flat brick wall and his voice clipped and no nonsense, looming over some soft and short scientist or technician and proposing the trade in very few words. 

“Oh my god,” he says, “You’re a highschool bully.” 

Maine gives him a mildly offended frown. 

“By accident, I’m sure,” he rushes to say. 

“North,” Grif says. “Noooorth.  _ You’re _ pretty buff.” 

“Wha--  _ no, _ Grif, oh my god. No.” 

“Why not!? You won’t even have to threaten anyone. Just take your shirt off and flex and glare at them like you’re South--”

“That’s so dumb--”

“And we’ll be swimming in cake! North! It’s perfect!” 

“I’m not doing that,” he says. 

“Why!?” Grif cries out, agonized and betrayed. He even makes his little hologram fall to its knees in the air. North’s mouth twitches up into a smile despite himself, trying to tamp down on his amusement. “Is my suffering funny to you?” 

“Of course not,” he says, and clears his throat. 

“Please,” he says. “Please, please, please--”

“Grif.” 

“--please, please, please--”

“Are you serious?” 

“--please, please, I’m so sick of vegetables, please--” 

“Are you being for real?” 

“--pleeeeeeaaaaaaaaseeeeeeeee--”

“You’re ridiculous.” 

Maine slides his plate of cake over to North’s side of the table. North and Grif both look at him. Maine apparently thinks that this gift doesn’t require any accompanying words, and continues his silent eating. 

“Quick! Eat it before he changes his mind!” Grif hollers

_ “Thank you,  _ Maine,” North says while giving Grif a Look. 

“Thanks,” Grif parrots him. 

Maine grunts and eats. 

“Eat it!” Grif says to North. 

“You know that dessert is for at the end of the meal, right?” he asks playfully. 

Grif gasps. “Don’t you  _ dare _ put me through that kind of torture.” 

“Alright, alright,” he says, smilingly giving in and pulling the cake towards himself to dig in. 

It  _ has  _ been a long time since he’s had anything sweet. Accompanied by Grif’s piggyback enjoyment, it tastes far better than a slice of cake has any right to taste. 


	27. lose

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Caboose,” she says between grit teeth, the name a strained exhalation.
> 
> No response. He’s logged off. He can’t hear her.

The missions is going well, as in it’s not effortless but Carolina’s confident that they’ll succeed despite it. It makes adrenaline thrum through her veins, excitement coursing through her like an electrical current. There’s gunfire, speeding cars, jumping off of buildings, yelling men and women, and blissful silence inside of her head. No voices to drown out the crystal clear clarity of what to do when the chips are down, nothing but paying close attention and letting her reflexes guide her body before she’s got even time to register what’s happening. Everything’s quicker than thought. She’s a perfect warrior, and everything is too fast and important for her to think a single thing. It’s _ perfect.  _

Maine cleaves man in half with his new weapon beside her, a bullet grazes her armor plating. She feels light, light, light. 

They’re inside a tunnel now, they have what they need, and they just have to come through on the other side and 479er will be there, waiting for them. Just get through the tunnel and win. They’re so close, it feels so inevitable. 

There’s an explosion of deafening sound next to her that would be disorienting if she hadn’t heard it enough times now for it to immediately register as grenade. 

_ Who the fuck throws a grenade inside of a tunnel,  _ she thinks, and then it starts collapsing on top of her. Rubble, too big to dodge. She grunts, steels herself, stops herself from being crushed. Every single part of her body strains to keep it upright, from squishing her flat against the ground. If she loses her leverage she won’t be able to get it back, pinned. A sitting duck. 

Maine, several feet in front of her, managed to avoid the rubble, and is busy with fighting more than half a dozen hostiles on his own. 

She’s shaking. It is so, so unbelievably heavy. 

Caboose would be perfect right now, she realizes. The exact situation he was made for. She wills for him to log back on. 

He doesn’t. Maine shoots a hostile, is shot at by two others. Her arms buckle an inch downwards and refuse to regain the ground against the rubble. 

“Caboose,” she says between grit teeth, the name a strained exhalation. 

No response. He’s logged off. He can’t hear her. 

She squeezes her eyes shut and leans harder against the rubble. Sounds of struggle from Maine’s direction, she’s too distracted to pay attention to it. 

How is she going to get Caboose to log on? She’d never asked York about it. She hadn’t thought to-- 

A part of her never thought that she’d actually need him. 

Her knees and back and arms _ burn. _ She’s going to pull a muscle. She’s going to _ lose.  _

No. Fuck no. 

Breathing shakily and carefully, she slowly inches along the rubble, her armor scraping against as she fights to keep it aloft and move at the same time. 

“Caboose,” her voice faltering like her body wants to, “Wake up.” 

More gunshots from Maine’s direction. Don’t look, don’t get distracted, just focus on getting out of here fast as you can first. 

This weight would be nothing with him here with her. If she just hadn’t shut him down because she couldn’t  _ stand _ him. 

Was that weak? Had that been weak of her? She’d thought she’d been being strong, making sure that there were no obstacles in her way. 

She should have been able to do what she had to do _ with _ the obstacles. 

With something almost like a scream she finally makes it out from underneath the rubble, flinging herself away and tucking her legs into her body as she collapses so that they won’t be trapped underneath. She doesn’t like the idea of trying to finish the missions on two broken feet. She turns her head to see--

Maine is lying on the ground one foot in front of her face, blood pooling beneath him. 

Carolina springs up and kills the remainder of the hostiles. Brutally, efficiently. 

If she’d only had Caboose-- if she could have lifted the rubble-- it’s his fault for not waking up-- hers for putting him to sleep--

When the last hostile falls, she hears a small, wet gurgle behind her. She looks to see Maine fumbling at his bleeding throat. Alive. 

It takes three steps to close the distance, two efficient, smooth movements to pull out the bio-foam and inject it. She drags him up, pulls him the rest of the way out of the tunnel. 

The weight would be lighter if Caboose was here. 

 

“He’s stable,” someone finally tells her. She’d thrown Maine at the doctors waiting in the cargo bay, reported, and then gone to the infirmary to keep pestering anyone that didn’t look like they were doing anything important for an update. She hasn’t eaten, she hasn’t slept, and she hasn’t had her own injuries treated. They’re negligible. Eating and sleeping can wait. Her head throbs with pain. The mission doesn't feel over yet. 

“Will he be able to come back out on the field eventually?” she asks. “How much do you think he’ll be able to recover? How long will it take? Any permanent injuries? What--” 

“We don’t know yet, Agent.” 

Everyone in the infirmary has already grown sick of her. She can hear it in their voices. It doesn’t matter. No one here has the balls or the rank to throw her out. No man left behind. She’ll stay until she knows for sure. 

She finds a corner that’s out of the way and leans back against the wall. She’ll give them fifteen minutes before she finds someone new to interrogate. 

“Caboose,” she says to herself, low and quiet enough that no one else should be able to hear. “Caboose. Wake up.” 

Fifteen minutes later, and she still hasn’t figured it out. 

Thirty minutes later, he still doesn’t answer her. 

One hour. Two hours. Three hours. 

Four hours into her vigil, her voice hoarse from questions and his name, she’s informed that Maine should recover just fine, but his voice is lost. He’s mute. That’s a liability. He’s an excellent agent, and she’s permanently sabotaged him because she didn’t want to keep her AI on all of the time. 

All of the other Freelancers with AIs have managed just fine with them. Even South. Even Wash. Florida, North, York, everyone but her. 

Maybe she’s just not… good enough. For an AI. 

(Maybe she’s just not enough, period.) 

She’s never thought of patience as a virtue. It’s just  _ waiting. _ It’s better to _do._ Instead of waiting for yourself to become better at something, just work at it relentlessly until you are. Instead of waiting to get something, chase it. Don’t wait. Don’t stagnate. Always move, always work,  _ burn  _ with impatience, use it as fuel, accelerate and fly. 

Maybe being impatient isn’t a good thing. Maybe she’s been weak and stupid and bad and wrong, when she’d thought she’d been pushing herself to do the right thing. 

She doesn’t really want Caboose, and now she doesn’t deserve him either. She misused him, wasted a perfectly good weapon when she needed it, when her teammate was on the line. 

She takes the AI chip out of her neck port, and her head feels even emptier. Not the wonderful kind of empty where her reflexes were faster than her thoughts, where her body moved before her mind because she knew in her muscles what the right move to make was. This is just hollow and strange and wrong. He’d grated on her like sandpaper every second he was there, but it doesn’t feel… this doesn’t feel right either, now. 

Maine is more patient than her. More deserving. He’s a good agent. He’ll… 

He’ll do better than her. 

“Nurse,” she says, and goes to give Caboose up. 


	28. how Maine joins

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He’s always known that he’s not the brains. He’s the brawn, and he does it fucking well.

This is how Maine joins Project Freelancer: 

 

He’s always known that he’s not the brains. He’s the brawn, and he does it fucking well. When he’s on the battlefield, he makes a tangible, noticeable difference. That says a lot. 

He’s big. He’s _ motivated,  _ too. When he was little (but big for his age, big enough to always stand out if he didn’t do his best to keep his mouth shut and blend into the background and be forgotten), he watched along with his classmates, as bombs streaked down from the sky like they were falling stars. The distant explosion for one moment felt almost like a fireworks display, big and pretty to look at, except then the _ noise _ had come, and the blast wasn’t done yet, it  _ kept going,  _ getting bigger and bigger until it had covered the entirety of the town it had landed in. The whole town. It had been unbelievable. He’d stared at it, silent and scared at the sheer scale of it. 

And then Suzy, who commuted from the big town over even though it was very far, started crying because her house was there, and then some of the other kids had realized that their parents worked there, and then it was  _ very _ noisy. There was a lot of crying, and some screaming. 

No one in his family should have been in town that day, except his brother had skipped school and gone there with his friends. 

His family moves planets. 

The new planet is glassed just before they get there. They’d sent all of their stuff ahead, so now they only own their toothbrushes and overnight bags. 

His parents talk to some people. They sign some papers. They live on a new colony now, owned by a private company. They work for the right to live there. They get wages, of course. But they do have to pay for rent, and food, and clothes, and an education for him and his little sister. They get it through the company, since the colony’s new and there are no other companies yet. 

Rent and food costs almost exactly as much as his parents get paid in wages, coincidentally. There might as well not be an exchange of money. It might as well be--

“Don’t say that word,” his mom says. “That’s not what’s happening. Don’t tell anyone you said that. We need this, honey.” 

There’s a clause in the contract about  _ defamation  _ and _ slander,  _ apparently. A punishing clause. He keeps his mouth shut. He gets good at keeping his mouth shut. 

He makes friends. Some of those friends get sad when their older siblings or parents or aunts or uncles die because of the war. Either as soldiers in it, or just as people going about their day when suddenly shooting stars that aren’t stars drop from the sky and take away an entire town like it’s nothing. 

He burns with the inability to do anything to fix it. To say anything that could fix it. The war, the company owned colony, his parents quietly hugging and crying when they think they’re alone, Muhammed next door who hasn’t left his bed since he found out his sister died two weeks ago. 

He wants to change things. He wants to fix this. Make a difference. End it. Go back to a time when he had happy parents and a brother and a sister and a house and the sky felt safe. 

He kills aliens like this time,  _ this _ kill, is finally going to change things. Just one more death.  One more fight. One more day. Over and over and over again, if he just tries hard enough, he’ll make a difference. 

He’d do anything, anything at all, if he thought for sure that it would finish this damned war. 

“I’ve heard about you,” the man with the smooth voice and dark, watchful eyes says, “and came a long way just to talk to you” 

He makes a  _ keep going  _ sound. 

“You have an impressive record,” he says, opening a file. It makes him think of a man casually bragging about his girlfriend or his gun, the way he pulls out and opens that file full of facts about him. _ Ooh, look at how impressive my security clearance is. Look at how big my dick is.  _

This rarely works on him, as he always knows for a fact that he’s got the biggest gun in the room, not to mention his dick. 

“Very many kills. Very many wins in the face of overwhelming odds. You’re strong. You’re  _ determined,  _ aren’t you?” 

He nods. 

“Can you keep a secret?” 

“Don’t gossip.” 

“I can believe that. Listen, the UNSC… it just doesn’t go far enough. It’s public. It worries about appearances. Not us. You haven’t even heard about us. And so we’ve got a lot more freedom than the UNSC. So long as we’re careful, we don’t have to follow quite as many… silly rules.” 

The Geneva Conventions, it sounds like. 

He wouldn’t mind torturing an alien, if that’s what it took. Killing alien civilians. They certainly don’t hesitate to do the same to them. 

“We’re going to end the war,” he says, “no matter the cost. What’s a little suffering in the face of victory?” 

He understands. 

“Would you like to make a difference with Project Freelancer?” 

“Yes,” he says. 

“Excellent. Welcome aboard, Agent Maine.” 


	29. talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maine wakes up to joy in his head.

Maine wakes up to joy in his head. 

He blinks slowly, disoriented by the feeling. He doesn’t really get happy like that, especially not at just waking up. 

Plus, he’s in pain, which tends to make him grumpy. Broken ribs, twisted ankle, gunshot in the leg, gunshot in the arm, gunshot in the midsection. 

Gunshot in the throat. 

He really is hardy. 

_ <Hi,> _ a voice he can’t pinpoint the location of says. Enthusiastic, overly loud, noticeably hopeful.  _ <Do you want to be my friend?> _

He blinks the sleep out of his eyes rapidly, looks around himself. He isn’t alone. Nurses, doctors, scientists, technicians. Whatever, they’re wearing white coats and scrubs and looking at him like he might suddenly explode. He puts them out of mind, looks for a beaming face. It’s the only kind of expression that could fit that kind of voice. Some puppy eyes to go with it as well--

_ <Are you playing eye spy?> _ the voice whispers conspiratorially.  _ <Can I join? Um, white!> _

Maine opens his mouth to say _ everything is white, _ and all that comes out is a faint wheeze, like the noise a stabbed soon to be corpse makes. 

_ <Oh, right, right,> _ the voice says, like it understood him anyways. No one in the room has opened their mouth yet. The voice came from everywhere and nowhere at once. It’s inside his head. 

Maine remembers. An offer from Carolina, delivered through a nurse. No one asking for a yes or a no, not that he could speak it, not that he could even nod or shake his head. He’d been woozy with blood loss, hurt, peeled free of his armor like a suddenly unprotected animal ripped away from its shell, and he’d thought  _ I can stop this. _ Rip free of the straps, fight his way past guards, doctors, steal a gun, some bio foam and bandages, an escape shuttle, go away. He’s confident he would have made it. He always does. (Except for this time, where Carolina had had to drag his bleeding carcass to evac while he’d gurgled like a fish on dry land.) 

Sharing his head with someone has never appealed to him. The ability to speak does not feel worth it to him, but he’d let it happen. 

He’d been told that he’d finally make some actual change if he came here, joined this secret organization. Maine hasn’t killed a single alien since he joined Project Freelancer. How is that change. How is that anything but _ regression,  _ doing even  _ less _ than before. Maybe this is what the Counselor had been talking about when he’d been feeding Maine lofty promises of ending the war. Maybe letting these people in white coats put another mind inside of him will let things finally start  _ happening.  _ Take a risk and he’ll finally be able to _ see  _ the change, feel it with his bare hands. 

_ <My name’s Caboose,> _ the AI inside of his head says. 

_ Maine, _ he mouths. 

_ <Hi Maine!!!> _ Caboose says, _ ecstatic  _ at a one word reply. 

Something flickers at the edge of Maine’s perception, something as intangible as a dream, a sense of being shut in a room with only one person and that one person stubbornly ignoring you and hating you no matter how hard you tried to make friends with them. Maine is good with solitude, is content just to sit unnoticed in a corner and soak in other people’s laughter and chatter to each other if he’s craving companionship, and so the overwhelming feeling of loneliness sinks through his defenses and knocks the breath out of him like a knife to the gut. 

Dazed, he misses the question the first time it’s posed. 

“How do you feel?” the woman in a white lab coat repeats. 

Maine looks at her flatly for a moment, and then after a moment of her trying not to squirm he reaches out an arm and gives her a thumbs down. A young man in scrubs has a sudden coughing fit. 

“Um,” the woman says. “Could ‘Caboose’ let us know the specifics?” 

Right. This is what he’s supposed to be for. 

“You want to talk to me too!?” Caboose says, appearing in a flash of blue light. 

“Ummmmm,” the woman says. 

_ Tell her I feel like shit, _ Maine thinks very hard, visualizing the sentence like he’s writing down the letters. 

“He feels like  _ oh my god I also put a dot over my i’s.”  _

“What?” the woman says. 

_ Most people do,  _ Maine thinks. 

Another giddy burst of happiness, just over Maine talking to him. He’s going to end up addicted to a computer chip’s joy at this rate. 

“Caboose,” the woman says, more sternly. “How does Maine feel?” 

“He feels the best!” 

“Really?” the woman asks, skepticism clear as day on her face. ‘Best’ did apparently not make sense going with a thumbs down to her. 

“Yes! He is nice and I love him.” 

That was fast. Maine is reminded of the way his mother loved dogs. She fell for every single one, hard and fast and unconditionally. 

“No-- how is  _ Maine _ feeling, not how do you feel about him--” 

Maine has a feeling Caboose is failing his test as translator. Maybe he could get away with giving him back to Carolina. Oh well, he’d tried, it just hadn’t worked out, time to give him back the privacy of his own thoughts and feelings. 

He thinks about shoving, shutting, and locking Caboose back in that room with the one person who refuses to like him, to tolerate him. It feels unnecessarily cruel. And he still hasn't made change happen yet. 

Maine stands up, towers over everyone as usual. 

“Oh!” Caboose says. “This feels right! Yes, my shoes were too short before, this is better.” 

He walks past the flustered scientists, out of the room. He’s never been much of a conversationalist anyways. He doesn’t need a translator, really. He can get by fine on his own without words. He was barely using them in the first place. 

He thinks,  _ do you miss Agent Carolina?  _

The carefree happiness stutters for a moment. And then, hurt and small,  _ <She doesn’t miss me.> _

Carolina has never struck him as a particularly sentimental woman. He doesn’t think that Caboose is wrong on this one. 

_ I think we can get along,  _ he thinks, and means it. In his opinion,  _ everyone _ talks too much. Caboose is not that big of a difference to him. He’s good at tolerating people who talk too much about things he doesn’t care about, a practiced hand. Also. He likes being strong. Likes making a difference. Caboose means more strength, more making a difference, finally doing something different and new, maybe what the project promised him. 

It feels easy to talk to someone without even talking. Like connecting to someone, but quietly, without walls of misunderstanding in the way. He likes it. 

Maine thinks he might like this. Shy and eager hopeful happiness in his skull, not his own. 

_ <I like you too.> _


	30. scream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Florida’s leg spasms like a fish dying on dry land.
> 
> “I can’t seem to stand up,” he observes calmly.

Florida collapses in the middle of a mission. One minute he’s fine, walking and laughing and joking and talking and killing, and the next he just falls to the floor. It’s not one of those memory thingamajigs that takes them far away to something that’s never happened and is as hard to hold onto as a dream, that starts and ends as abruptly as someone switching the channel on life for a moment and then changing their mind and going back to the right station. His legs just stop working. 

“Huh,” Florida says. “What’s that about?” 

_ <Mayhaps someone tried to assassinate us Looney Tunes style and dropped a banana peel on the floor,> _ Sarge suggests. 

Florida’s leg spasms like a fish dying on dry land. 

“I can’t seem to stand up,” he observes calmly. 

_ <Maybe someone sniped you,> _ he says, uneasy, a possibility that he doesn’t want to entertain trying to make itself known at the back of his mind. 

“Sniping doesn’t tend to happen in hallways with no windows,” Florida says thoughtfully. “And I see only corpses.” 

Perhaps new bullets that can pass through walls without touching them have been made. Or teleporting bullets. Diabolical! Exciting! 

Except Florida isn’t even bleeding from his leg. His back, his head, his arms, sure, but not his leg. This time. 

Sarge makes himself pay real attention to the leg, the kind you can only do if you’re deeply wired into a man’s brain and have the processing ability to deeply analyse it. 

He’s not like the Simmons boy. He can’t fix anything. Just see, just understand how bad the damage is, what the damage is, so he can let Florida know without him having to be distracted by feeling it, except then Florida goes ‘it’s fine, I’m going to jump out of this building now’ and it’s so  _ fun  _ that Sarge goes along with it and doesn’t think about anything else but glorious violence and victory. 

There is a long split in Florida’s leg bone. A fracture, a crevasse, a crack. 

Pain is a poorly designed function. It’s a computer telling you that something’s wrong with it, but then it doesn’t let you do anything to fix it because you can’t use it because the screen keeps freezing to tell you I’M BROKEN, I’M HURT. Message received, fella, now go away so you can actually do something about it. Pain is like that. It has one job and one job only: to let you know how you’re hurt and discourage you from doing what got you hurt again. To keep you alive. It’s important work, but there’s so many cons to it. 

Sarge took that pesky, buggy, poorly designed warning away so that Florida could focus on other things, and he was supposed to replace it. And he forgot to. Because he was having fun. 

“Ah, it’s finally stopped twitching,” Florida says, and with slow caution starts to stand up again. 

_ <You can’t stand on that,> _ Sarge says, feels the split in the bone grow by a quarter inch. 

Florida experimentally puts his weight on it. Another quarter inch. “Apparently, I can.” 

_ <You’re hurting yourself, idiot!> _ he barks. 

“Not really,” Florida says, and then roughly stomps down on the head of a supposed-to-be corpse that groans with his injured leg. The skull caves. A full half inch more cracks open inside of Florida’s leg. 

_ <You’re making it worse, you dunderhead,> _ he says.  _ <Sit down and shut up and drink some healing tea with oxytocins in it or something!> ‘ _

“Do you understand what that is?” he asks curiously. 

_ <Some kinda bomb ingredient? It doesn’t matter, just sit down!> _

“The mission isn’t over,” Florida observes. “I really can’t just lie down in enemy territory for a quick nap.” 

_ <Then get your keister to a friendly infirmary ASAP,> _ he painfully concedes. 

“Can do,” he says pleasantly, “as soon as I’m done with the mission, of course.” 

_ <Do you not know what ASAP stands for, son? It certainly isn’t ‘At your leisure you Smart Ass Problem maker!’> _

“A _ long  _ stretch, that one.” 

_ <Get. To. Evac.> _

“The Director appreciates and rewards _ results.  _ Do people without results get fun missions? No. They get boring ones where they sit and wait and watch and then go away without even fighting anyone.” 

_ <You ain’t in no shape to fight so much as a pasty noodle shaped goatee wearing pencil pusher, much less actual enemy forces,> _ he seethes. 

“I can feel your concern,” Florida says. “It’s  _ sweet,  _ but unneeded.” 

Sweet. He is _ angry _ not-- not worried or-- 

“What do you feel guilty for?” he asks curiously. 

Florida takes a step and the crack grows infinitesimally. He’s going to lose the whole leg at this rate. Sarge took his pain out behind the shed and blew it’s brains out, certain that he had it under control. 

He  _ does _ it have under control. He will take control. He will make Florida listen and not lose his damned leg. 

_ <Call in for early evac,> _ Sarge orders.  _ <Tell them you’re too wounded to continue.> _

“I’m not.” 

_ <You are.> _

“I’ll just have to actually finish the mission then and show you--” 

Sarge lets the pain flow through Florida’s body uninterrupted for the first time since the first day he woke up in him. Florida falls again, except this time he screams. 

Sarge-- hadn’t expected screaming. Hadn’t braced himself for--

  
  
  


_ The boy screams like a stuck pig, only stops because he’s run out of air. Tears run down his face without shame. He’s never had shame when it comes to crying, and even if he had then he’s sure the pain would’ve knocked that out of his skull by now.  _

_ “Don’t even think about it,” Sarge growls, seeing the gun raising out of the corner of his eye, full of a terrified fury. “Don’t--!” _

_ Caboose gets out a bleary, dazed, “Tuck--?” _

  
  
  


Sarge is dazed and scattered, he can’t move, and coupled with the screaming it makes him  _ frantic. _ He has to make it stop, has to save his--

The screaming abruptly cuts off. Florida pants. Sarge had turned his unit back on without thinking. The plan had been to let Florida feel the pain to hammer in how hurt he was, to paralyze him so that Sarge could radio in for evac but-- no. Sarge isn’t gonna listen to him scream for any longer. 

“Point made,” Florida says, and calls for evac himself. 

The crack in the bone is still there. Sarge still let it happen. The echo of screams still rings loud and clear inside his mind. He can’t stop thinking about Caboose for some reason. Blue armor. That must be it. 

Florida doesn’t stand up. He also doesn’t talk to Sarge. But Sarge feels his attention on him loud and clear, like an animal that’s suddenly discovered that the small critter that it’s been letting stay close to their side is  _ dangerous.  _

Sarge likes being dangerous, but for some reason he hates this. 


	31. punch something

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _ <You’re gonna make me talk to a girl!?> _
> 
> York _snorts._ This is _not funny._ Carolina is _scary_ and could crush his chip in her hand without exerting herself.
> 
> “She’s an agent,” he says. “Come on, there’s nothing to be scared of. She won’t get cooties on you.”

Simmons is monologuing an entire essay about why Sharknado 5 is the best Sharknado to York who is notably only half listening and indulging him when he should in fact be trying to tear down his arguments and prove that his own clearly inferior choice is superior. Has the man never heard about passionate arguing as a friendly passtime?

And then he sees a flicker of red out of the corner of York’s functioning eye, and accidentally lets his internal audio become a high pitched definitely-not-a-shriek sound for a solid two seconds as he’s abruptly and totally convinced that an enemy’s snuck up on them for some irrational reason.

“ARGH,” York says, dropping his fork on the floor.

“Whoa, there,” Carolina says, holding up her hands.

“Lina! Shit! Sorry, we just got, uh, startled.” He picks up his forks, frowns down at it, and sets it away. What’s he gonna do, eat the rest of his scrambled eggs with his hands?

“We?” she asks along with a raised eyebrow, sitting down next to him along with a tray of her own subpar but high on proteins and essential vitamins breakfast.

“Yeah, you know, me and… Simmons…” It’s getting harder to tell who realizes something first between the two of them since the other immediately follows, but _one_ of them recovers tact a bit too late as York’s eye strays down to Carolina’s neck. They can’t quite see it since she’s turned towards them, but her neck port is empty. She gave Caboose to Maine after his injury. If they hadn’t known it by the gossip that inevitably sprung up on a ship with no wifi and no leave, they would have when they walked in on Maine easily bench pressing not just weights, but equipment. _Juggling_ it.

“You didn’t used to be so jumpy.” She turns away from York’s gaze and turns her focus on picking at her food instead.

Simmons does not feel guilty, he does not, fuck it _yes he does._ He’s turned York into as much of a spastic hair trigger flinchy--

“There’s bound to be bleedthrough,” York says, “on _both sides.”_ He grabs Carolina’s fork from her own tray and starts eating his breakfast again. She gives him a dirty look and Simmons wants to freeze up in the hopes that she’ll turn her attention elsewhere. “Don’t worry, Simmons, if she was actually mad then I’d be on the floor about now. And we can share the fork, Carolina.”

“Presumptuous of you,” she says, and then snatches the fork out of his hand, takes a bite of her own meal, and then hands it back to him. “And it’s just that I certainly didn’t notice anything like that happening with myself. I didn’t get louder or stupider, and Caboose didn’t get a better work ethic.”

“That’s not your only character trait. Did he get cockier?” A friendly smile to go with a friendly tease.

“It’s called confidence, and not that I noticed.”

“Hmm,” York hums, takes a bite of bacon and then tosses the fork to her. She deftly catches it out of the air, adding a little showy spin as a flourish. “Yeah, definitely not cocky _at all.”_

No bleedthrough. Was that because Simmons was the abnormal one, or Carolina? He intensely wants the Counselor’s notes on them, not for the first time. He just wants to know how much he’s doing wrong is because he’s doing it wrong or because it’s out of his hands and this is just how it is. He’s not sure which answer he wants, but an end to the uncertainty would at least be something.

Carolina leans into York’s side, and Simmons’ stream of thoughts abruptly screech to a halt. Her skin is warm against York’s. York’s heart quickens. York thinks she’s amazing. Simmons thinks she’s intimidating. They’re both right. They’re both feeling different things. She hasn’t touched him since--

“I can’t hurt you now,” she says quietly.

“Yes you can,” he says, and why does it come out _fond?_ Sometimes you can’t understand a person even when you’re living inside of them.

“Not by accident.”

“I’ll grant you that. Simmons, would you be fine with logging--?”

Carolina’s grip, that had nestled onto York to hold onto him, goes tight and bruising.

 _“Ow,”_ slips out of him, and Carolina lets go of him, leans away. York feels regret.

“How,” she says. “How do you get an AI to log back on.”

“Oh, uh,” York says. “Simmons? You wanna take this?”

_ <You’re gonna make me talk to a girl!?> _

York _snorts._ This is _not funny._ Carolina is _scary_ and could crush his chip in her hand without exerting herself.

“She’s an agent,” he says. “Come on, there’s nothing to be scared of. She won’t get cooties on you.”

 _ <What the fuck do you mean there’s _ nothing to be scared of? _Look at her! She’s ripped! > _

“So is Maine, and you’re not scared of him, are you?”

_ <A little bit actually, yeah!> _

“Oh. Huh. Well, she just wants to talk. Come on, dude, it’ll be fine.”

Simmons does not like this at all, but also Carolina is looking at them _intently,_ and he feels the urge to do whatever she says to get her to move on. He turns on his hologram. She turns her gaze to that, which feels a bit like she’s looking right over his shoulder off to the side. It weirdly relaxes him.

“Ah, uh, um,” he says. York snickers. He bristles, annoyed. “If after having deliberately logged off an AI wants to log back on, then they need to have set a reboot timer before they logged off. Otherwise, it would have to be done to them manually.”

“Manually,” she says in a terrifyingly flat voice. “What does that entail.”

“Um, well, you wouldn’t really be able to do that since it’d be like doing surgery to yourself. You’d have to go to the lab--”

“I see,” she says, and then stands up. She isn’t looking at either of them any longer. It doesn’t look like she’s looking at anything in particular.

“Where are you going?” York asks, sounding only a bit like a forlorn puppy.

“Training,” she says.

“Of course. Can we come with?”

“Finish your meal.” And then she stalks out of the cafeteria, looking as tense as a tripwire.

“... Dude,” Simmons says. “Have you ever finished a conversation with her that hasn’t ended with her broodily stalking off to punch something?”

“I swear to god it’s happened before.”

“Suuuure.”

“I mean it!”

“Yeah, and I’ve got a girlfriend in Canada.”

 _“Grif’s_ gonna broodily stalk off to punch something if he hears that.”

“What?”

“We really don’t have the same taste in people,” York sighs, and then starts back in on his meal with Carolina’s fork.

“York, what does that mean!?”


	32. static

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Maine wants to do a specific thing. The only problem is that he doesn’t know what it is.

Maine really wants to do something, Caboose can tell. But not just anything. He doesn’t want to draw, or climb, or play with anyone. Which is  _ boring,  _ but at least he doesn’t ignore Caboose. He doesn’t talk a lot, but at least he talks some. Inside his head. 

Maine wants to do a specific thing. The only problem is that he doesn’t know what it is. 

_ To win the war,  _ he says. He moves his lips along with the words, but doesn’t bother pushing air through with them. 

_ <Great!> _ he says.  _ <Let’s do that!> _

Maine puts more weight on the-- the lifting stick. The stick you push up and down while you lie on your back and aren’t allowed to use like a bat. 

_ <... How do we do that?> _

_ That’s the problem.  _

_ <Oh.> _ He thinks about this for some time while Maine lifts the lifting stick. Maine’s impatience nips at him, like lice on his scalp, a constant grating background noise.  _ <We should ask someone smart how to do that, then!> _ Asking for help always makes things better. 

_ Do we know someone smart.  _

Caboose thinks. Tucker, no. Simmons is silly. Donut likes being pretty more than being smart. Sarge just likes to shout. 

_ <Grif?> _ he tries. 

_ He’s smart? _ Maine feels dubious. 

_ <I don’t know. Maybe? Do you know anyone smart?> _

He feels Maine think about it, images floating up to the top of his mind. South shouting and exploding a door after it wouldn’t pull open even though it was labeled push. Florida smilingly breaking his fingers and laughing. Washington doing a flawless triple backflip and then tripping and falling over nothing. York failing to unlock a door and setting off the alarm, and then four more memories of him doing the exact same thing. Carolina--

Caboose makes his holo body happen, looks around for something to do. “Can we climb up to the ceiling?” It’s full of beams and rafters that look like they’d be _ really _ fun to balance on and jump across. 

Maine cringes.  _ No heights.  _

“Awwww.” 

_ Maybe North is smart. I’m not sure.  _

“Let’s ask him!” 

They track North down, which mainly means Maine asking someone whether or not North was on a mission, except he had to ask through Caboose, which confused them for some reason? Like, he was  _ really _ clear. He even described what he looked like, which is like a purple, sad, sleepy sloth with a long gun. Anyways, North isn’t on a mission, which is great because it means he’s on the ship! With them! It’s a big ship but they’ll find him eventually. Caboose is really good at hide and seek so long as he doesn’t get distracted and forget that he’s playing it. He isn’t in the training room, or the other training room, or the other other training room, or  _ any _ of the training rooms, or any of the broom closets, or the cafeteria. Instead, he was  _ hiding _ in his  _ room.  _

_ We should have checked here first, _ Maine thinks, feeling exasperated with himself. 

“The last place we would have ever expected,” Caboose says, nodding wisely. 

“Maine?” North asks, sitting up in his bed. Had he been napping? 

Maine feels mild surprise at this. Caboose gets the notion that Freelancers aren’t supposed to have nap times, which is silly. No wonder they’re all so cranky all of the time. 

“Is there an emergency?” 

Maine shakes his head. 

“Then I’d wish you’d knock,” he chides gently. 

Maine gives him a Look. 

“Just saying.” 

“Why don’t any of the doors on this ship have fucking locks?” Grif asks, projecting from North’s helmet propped up on his nightstand like a decapitated head. It’s hard to remember that they’ve all got faces underneath the helmets sometimes. 

“They do,” North says, “just not our bedrooms. It’s not necessary.” 

“What if you’d been jacking off, though?” 

“Grif, we have guests.” 

“It’s a serious question.” 

“So, Maine, Caboose! What’s up?” 

“How do you end the war, North Pole?” 

“Uh,” North says. 

_ It’s North Dakota, _ Maine thinks. He doesn’t feel eager or curious, like he thinks North actually has an answer. Just content to stand back and let Caboose talk to Grif and North. That’s fine! It’s nice that Maine will stand still so Caboose can talk to his other friends too. 

He thinks it’s a little bit funny how increasingly awkward North is looking, though. Maine is kind of mean. That’s okay, Caboose still likes him. 

_ “ _ Well,” North says. 

“Jesus, I feel like someone just asked me how babies are made or what happens after someone dies.” 

_ “Grif.”  _

“Am I wrong?” 

“Is there a button?” Caboose asks. “Someone we can ask pretty please? Ooh! Do the aliens have a manager? Oh, oh, or a mom!  That’s great, I always listen to my mom.” 

There is a brief confused silence. 

“Caboose, you don’t have a mom,” Grif says. 

“Wait, are you talking about the Director?” North asks. “Is the Director your mom?” 

“North, EW,” Grif says. “That’d mean he’s  _ my _ mom!” 

Caboose is thinking about his mom. She… huh. She’s? 

He can’t remember. 

He has one, though. Just like how he knows that there’s a sky, and machines keeping the air safe for them to breathe. Just a part of how the world is. 

She’s… 

  
  
  


_ “Michael.” A hand stroking his curly hair.  _

  
  
  


“--sorry, Caboose,” North is saying. “I just don’t know. All of humanity’s trying to answer that question. There’s no easy solution, I think. Everyone wants to end this war. If it weren’t so hard then it’d already be over.” 

_ That’s not true, _ Maine thinks. Thinks about guns, factories, money. Caboose doesn’t quite get it. He’s thinking about a woman stroking his hair. He makes his holo hand pat his holo helmet. No hair. Just a helmet. It’s hard to remember that they’ve all got faces underneath the helmets sometimes. 

Does he? Is there a face underneath? 

She’d called him Michael. That doesn’t feel right. He’s just Caboose. It’s what everyone calls him. 

“Caboose?” Grif asks. “You, uh, you okay?” 

Maine feels unsettled, like something’s subtly wrong but he can’t place it. 

Caboose makes his hologram take the helmet off. 

Underneath, there’s only static. 


	33. people

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sarge was an asset, like a knife or his armor. He was a fine conversation partner, free entertainment. He _ was.  _
> 
> Now he is something more.

Sarge was an asset, like a knife or his armor. He was a fine conversation partner, free entertainment. He _ was.  _

Now he is something more. Something _ interesting. _ A genuine threat. He could suddenly cripple Florida at the most inopportune moment, as good as a death sentence. Normally, if Florida thought that a fellow squad member then he’d just kill him in a way no one would notice. Push him over a cliff side while patrolling and say he slipped on his own, shoot him during the chaos of battle and let his death be the fatality of some anonymous accidental ‘friendly fire’, or even just pretend not to notice it when he needed assistance on the battlefield and not give it to him. 

But Sarge cannot be pushed or shot or left to his own devices. His fate is intertwined with Florida’s. Perhaps Florida could try and pull him out on his own and hope that it doesn’t end in his own brain damage, see if he could find a way to destroy the sturdy chip. That wouldn’t fly with the Director, though. It would be noticed. It would be punished. 

Florida enjoys his place in Project Freelancer very much. He isn’t ready to lose it at the first sign of a little genuine danger. 

So he chooses to view this positively. Not a dire problem to be solved, but an exciting gamble with high stakes, a fascinating puzzle. That’s Florida’s way, anyways. He likes enjoying himself. He’s good at it. It suits him. 

Sarge has been a steady source of excitement and interest and humor and the fun kind of indignant rage and occasional fondness in the back of his skull until now. Florida had taken it all in with fascination, not entirely understanding all of it. Anger is rarely felt, and avoided. It’s unpleasant and makes him do foolish things. Fondness happens sometimes, but it feels different from the way Sarge feels it in a way he can’t place. If Sarge’s design is based off of more traditional human emotions, then Florida finally has his confirmation that he isn’t quite right. That’s fine. He likes the way he is. He likes being him. 

Sarge isn’t a steady source of those emotions any longer now, though. He’s feeling different emotions, and yet again they feel just off enough to Florida that he can’t immediately place them. It’s… muted. Negative. Maybe? 

It’s… sulking. Like a child who’s doesn’t know how to make up with their best friend after a silly argument. 

He can only draw that metaphor from books he's read, movies he’s watched. Unjudging, unsuspecting sources he’s mined for proper reactions, how people are  _ supposed _ to feel when certain things happen. He had disagreements with his classmates as a child like any other kid. It’s just that the way the way the disagreements  _ ended _ was unusual. He didn’t sulk, or long to be forgiven. He hadn’t yet learned to smile and let unimportant things go yet. He’d wanted to be understood. He’d been frustrated when he couldn’t make himself understood. He’d thought that maybe with some blood and lost teeth and broken noses, he could  _ make _ them understand, make them try harder. 

People don’t work like that, unfortunately. That would be too sensible, too understandable. The rules are arbitrary, numerous, unguessable, and, worst of all,  _ fluid.  _ Impossible. Hopeless. A lost cause. Fully understanding is out of his reach, seamlessly blending in is out of his reach. Instead, he just tries to hide the most offensive parts of himself so he doesn’t get locked up or put down, relies on the easy script of common manners and empty pleasantries, and contents himself with being strange and off putting the rest of the time. It’s fine. It’s good, even. Being perfectly himself instead of imperfectly someone else is far more fun than the alternative. Attempting normalcy would only end in inevitable failure. Just staying out of jail and staying alive is a far more feasible goal, and less miserable besides. 

He learned how to smile and let go instead. Other people's opinions don’t really matter, unless they could get you in trouble. Like if they could report you for mutilating your squad member’s corpse. Or fire you from your favorite job in the world. Or cripple you with pain with a thought. Then they suddenly start to matter very much. 

Sarge was a fun tool, a conversation partner, entertainment that didn’t stop talking just because Florida said something strange. A good thing in his life. He liked him. He enjoyed him. But he could live without him. He could sacrifice him. 

He’s something more now. Something very important. As untouchable as the Director, as vital. Florida’s position  _ depends _ on his goodwill. It’s a priority now. It will be important to balance what Sarge wants with what Florida wants, now, to keep him satisfied. And the Director. 

Huh. Florida’s never had to keep more than one person happy at a time before. He’s sure it’ll go fine, though. Two is not much more than one. And it seems unlikely that there’ll be a conflict of interest. Sarge wants mindless fights, and the Director wants whatever it is that he wants, and he uses the Freelancers to achieve that through mindless fights. Florida doesn’t see either of those things changing any time soon. 

He can do this. 

 

Florida taps on Maine’s visor like a child with a fishbowl. Maybe he’ll catch the attention of the little blue fish swimming inside. 

Maine, his hands full with weights and his voice gone, somehow manages to give him a dry stare through the helmet before he goes back to lifting his weights. Florida knocks on his visor now, that charming domestic little rhythm, a few rapid knocks followed by two more final ones, a small universal melody. 

“Hello Agent Maine says to say that no one is at home except we are both actually at home but shhh we are hiding from the pamphlet men who are you so we are drawing the curtains and turning off the lights and lying down on the floor even though I don’t really want to play hide and seek right now and it’s fine if you want to talk about Santa Claus at me we can just drink lemonade together and I can draw while you talk or I could also talk about something while you also don’t listen to me at the same time. That sounds fun!” 

It’s fortunate that AIs don’t need to draw breath. 

“That’s alright, Caboose,” Florida says pleasantly. “I’m not here to talk about Santa Claus.” 

“Well that is good because it isn’t Santa season yet. Look outside! It’s space season.” 

“It’s space season all of the time in space.” 

_ “Global warming.”  _

“I think it would be galactic warming, and actually the galaxy is getting colder because of entropy which is slowly squeezing the life out of the universe like a chokehold, or perhaps a pillow, although that’s actually a very inconvenient way to kill someone. Unwieldy. Slow going.” 

“What?” 

“Sarge wants to talk to you.” 

“I what now?” Sarge asks, popping up, speaking up, his hologram appearing. He surfaces from his murky pool of vaguely stressed and negative feelings enough to be confused. Or bamboozled, perhaps. Confused seems a too ordinary word for him. 

“He misses you,” Florida says. 

“I will stand still and quiet so he can hit me,” Caboose promises. 

“That’s so sweet of you, but I mean emotionally.” 

“I WHAT?” 

“He thinks of you very fondly. He’d be happier if you spoke more often.” 

“HOW DARE YOU?” 

Caboose sputters, touched. 

“STOP THAT THIS INSTANCE.” 

“I like you too!” Caboose says. 

Maine keeps steadily lifting his weights without pause or input, seemingly perfectly content to go about his own business without disturbing them. 

“SHUT YOUR TRAP,” Sarge howls miserably, glowing with embarrassed happiness. 

“I don’t like traps. They jump out at you and shout like scary movies and it’s-- it’s bad.” 

“Ambushes are better,” Florida agrees. “More personal. And scary movies often get so much wrong.” Like how much hurt a body can take before it collapses, gives up, and dies. Florida knows. 

“THIS IS A BETRAYAL OF THE HIGHEST ORDER!” 

“You two are so cute together, I could just  _ eat _ you.” 

Sarge has been utterly, thoroughly, irrevocably distracted. He’s so flustered Florida wonders if some part of him is going to overheat at any moment. He’s so happy too. 

Florida can do this. He can visit Caboose and Simmons and Donut and even Grif and Tucker, because he can feel that that’s what Sarge really wants. If he won’t let Florida fight when he’s injured, despite how much he loves it too, then maybe  _ this _ will give him some sway, some peace and leverage. What he really, really wants. Just to talk to them. 

Florida doesn’t really get it. Just like he doesn’t really get humans, or aliens, not really. Looking in from the outside. Sarge is confusing and unpredictable and inconsistent and Florida cannot entirely understand him, relate to him, predict him, put him at perfect ease. He can try and try and try, and in the end they’ll always be just a bit too different. All Florida can try and do is understand him  _ enough. _ Enough to coexist and live and keep getting what he needs and wants. 

AIs are, without a doubt, people. How inconvenient. 


	34. brood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes you just want to train until you feel your knuckles bleed.

“It was CRAZY,” Tucker says. “He just  _ tipped _ the  _ whole tank _ on his _ own  _ and squashed ‘em!” 

Carolina, who was about to turn a corner to go to her favorite training room, instead lurks behind it and eavesdrops. Like some highschool wallflower afraid of bullies or social interaction, or an awkward nerd, or someone who’s  _ guilty--  _

\--she’s just curious. And conversations tend to die around her. At least the ones about AIs. 

“Nuh uh,” North’s AI says. Greg? She remembers Tucker because Caboose was so happy it made her weak in the knees when he saw him. His name had reverberated inside her head like a gong, head splitting and disorienting. Nauseous with joy, overstimulated, too much. The joy Carolina feels on her own is soft and amused and tentative, carefully cradled before she puts it away in a box when she needs to get back to work. The only happiness one should feel while working is pride and satisfaction at a job well done. Confidence is a kind of happiness. 

_ “Yeah _ uh,” Tucker says obstinately. 

“It’s actually true,” Wash says. “I was there!” 

“We did assume that if Tucker was there then so were you,” North says. 

“What do you mean  _ actually _ true,” Tucker says, tone wounded and defensive. 

“Shit, that’s cool,” Greg (Grim?) admits. “They’re a real goddamned powerhouse.” 

“Not as much we’re gonna be as soon as Wash gets used to my zippyness!” 

“Get back to me when you can flip tanks.” 

“We’ve got a  _ laser sword.”  _

“Flipped. Tank. ‘Nuff said.” 

“Caboose’s potential really is amazing,” North says thoughtfully. “I had no idea he could be that much of a game changer on the battlefield. He and Maine make for a great team.” 

Carolina turns around and heads for one of the other training rooms instead. 

 

FILS can run a hologram simulation that’s much more useful than a punching bag. Enough of a give to it that you know that you’ve hit your target, but it vanishes with barely any resistance so you don’t do any harm to yourself during long training sessions, and best of all it can move in randomized patterns around you so you’re too busy tracking your targets to think. 

Carolina tapes up her knuckles and goes for the punching bag. Sometimes you just want to train until you feel your knuckles bleed. Caboose isn’t around in her head to distract her or whine and complain about a little pain that isn’t even his. There’s nothing stopping her. 

She feels her mouth twist. Caboose. That whole mess. What Simmons said. What the fuck is she supposed to do with any of that? What’s the correct path, there? There’s always a correct path. Whether or not she finds it, can follow it without straying, is entirely up to her. 

Just like how she’d strayed off the path with her AI. (No longer her AI.) 

Or had he pushed her off? No. No. No. That’s making excuses. It was her fault for not dodging his push. She could have done it. She knew he was incompetent. She should have seen something like that coming. She should have been on guard. She should have been prepared. She should have paid more attention,  _ thought _ more. She was stupid and lazy and selfish and reckless and she isn’t supposed to be any of those things. 

Carolina had once had a friend back in high school. Well, she was more like a track club rival since she was perpetually in second place behind Carolina, but Sara wasn’t a sore loser and they did talk to each other more than Carolina did with anyone else, so she supposed they  _ were _ friends. 

One time, right before a big track meet, Carolina got stupid and twisted her ankle right before the race. Slipped on some ice. Should’ve seen it. Her own fault. 

She ran the race anyways, because quitting wasn’t acceptable. (Even if her dad hadn’t come, and she’d never expected otherwise so there was no reason to be disappointed.) It had been agony. But worse than the agony, she’d lost. Sara came in first place. Carolina second. 

Sara had found her in the changing room crying bitter tears as she forced her swollen ankle out of her tight, constricting sock. She’d been horrified. She’d been comforting. She’d gotten scissors for the socks, and the first aid kit, and she’d said things. 

Things like: You shouldn’t have run that race. You really hurt yourself. Winning isn’t that important. It’s just track. 

Things like: It’s okay. Second place is really good, you know. There’s no reason to be upset. You were great. 

Things like: We both know you would have made first place if you hadn’t hurt yourself. You’re great. Don’t be sad. 

Things like: You shouldn’t be so harsh on yourself. You don’t have to be the best all of the time, every single time. That’s impossible. That’d be suicide. Be kinder to yourself, okay? Please? You have nothing to be ashamed of today. You should be proud. I’m proud of you. 

And Sara had smiled encouragingly and hugged her. 

Carolina had looked at her and thought  _ losses are losses and you only get to be happy about winning. Comforting yourself in the face of defeat is nothing but licking your wounds so that you will be content with mediocrity. Silverlines are bullshit and a lie. People comforting you after your fucks ups is a well intentioned attack.  _

She’d said, “Thanks,” and left without another word on her twisted, swollen, aching ankle. Sara wasn’t her friend. She was a competitor looking to make her give up so  _ she _ could have first place. 

Silverlines are bullshit. Being kind to yourself is bullshit. Being jealous of the fact that the stupid, annoying, worse than useless AI you ignored and threw away is getting along great with and being useful to someone else (that she got hurt, let down, disappointed) is bullshit. She should want that. What did she want? Did she want for it go horribly? For Maine to ignore Caboose too? For Caboose to continue being worse than useless? For Maine to accidentally horribly hurt someone on his own side too? 

So it wouldn’t be her fault, but Caboose’s. Out of her hands. An explanation, an excuse,  forgiveness. She couldn’t use him. Maine couldn’t use him. Therefore, no one could. It’s only allowed to fail at the impossible. Not her fault. 

She’d been looking to lick her wounds without letting herself know, the suffering of her teammate be damned. 

How horrible. How selfish. How cowardly. How weak. She’s not supposed to be those things. 

“Agent Carolina,” FILS says over the small training rooms speakers. “You’re going to break your knuckles.” 

People asking you to be kind to yourself are sabotaging you, whether they know it or not. 

“Run my favorite program then,” she spits, because goddamn her if she’s going to take a break. She’s in the mood to brood and punch something. 


	35. itchy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Was he tricked?

_ <You feel itchy.> _

That’s one way of putting it. Another way of putting it would be that Maine’s body is a container, and he’s being filled and filled with something to the point that it’s too much. Too much something for his whole body, large as it is. So much that his skin feels tight with it, like it’s going to split open from the pressure and it’s all going to come spilling out like a dam collapsing. So much that all of his muscles are tense like the metal walls of a submarine too deep down in the ocean for its own good, the steel letting out eerie noises like a large dying animal as the enormous pressure tries to crush it like a soda can. His muscles  _ ache _ from how long he’s been tense. 

Itchy is one way of putting it. 

_ <Scratch it,> _ Caboose whines. _ <Scratch it scratch it scratch it scratch it scratch it--> _

He can’t scratch it. 

_ <Why not!?> _

He’s not allowed to. 

_ <Why?> _

Why. 

_ <Who?> _

The Director. The Counselor. 

_ <Why won’t they let us scratch it?> _ he asks, hurt, confused. An unfair rule without an explanation offered, only obedience expected. 

Because. Because Maine doesn’t get explanations. He gets orders. He doesn’t really want explanations. He wants orders. But he doesn’t want _ these  _ orders. He doesn’t want the orders to go and steal this memory stick or to eliminate this base or to kill this squad or anything that he’s been ordered to do the entire time he’s been here on this damned ship on this damned project. But he swallowed it and he obeyed those orders because the orders that he wanted where just around the corner, he just had to go through this first. He doesn’t know why it’s necessary, he’s just assured that it is. 

Maine doesn’t know how to stop the war, and he doesn’t think he’ll ever think of how to do it. But history needs thinkers and  _ doers.  _ He just needs for someone to think the solution and then he’ll do it all cost, no matter what. And this was it, he thought. The Director, the project. His thinker to come up with the solution and give him his orders and the neat and simple instructions of what to do to stop the war. 

Maine would shred all of the skin off his body if he knew it would stop the war. He would break every bone in his body. Shed every drop of blood he has. He would go through agony. He would commit atrocities. He’d do anything, no matter how hard, so long as it’s simple. Because if it’s simple, then it’s easy, even if it’s hard. You just have to do it. Simple. Easy. 

He’s lost count of how many days, weeks, months he’s been with the project. It could be years. Every single day and night looks the same on the Mother of Invention. Same schedule, same routine, same training drills, same missions, same teammates, same enemies, same ship, same days, same nights. Looking through the thick glass windows of the ship, it never changes. Stars and inky blackness, never changing. Never, ever, ever changing, no matter how much Maine wants for it to, no matter how willing he is to throw his life away for it. He _ burns _ for this, and that should count for something, and yet it  _ doesn’t.  _

He still hasn’t killed a single alien since he joined Project Freelancer. He’s working and working and burning and burning and waiting and waiting and still, still, the orders that he wants, the simple and easy instructions for just exactly how he has to rip himself apart to stop the war  _ aren’t coming.  _

Are they ever coming? 

Has he wasted all of this time? 

Was he tricked? 

_ I don’t know, _ he mouths. 

_ <It’s itchy,> _ he complains, dissatisfied. That makes two of them. 


	36. outside

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _ <Do you want to go eat?> _
> 
> Maine doesn’t notice him.
> 
> _ <Do you want to go visit Florida Man and Sarge?> _
> 
> Maine continues to stew.
> 
> _ <Do you want to go and draw?> _
> 
> Maine stares at the wall.
> 
> Something even more exciting, then.

_ <\--and Tucker said that he didn’t think that they were left or right handed because they’re just dogs and I said that he was being stupid everyone’s left or right handed or maybe left or right footed, right? But then he said that _ I _was being stupid-- > _

Maine is ignoring him. Except not. He’s _not paying attention_ to him, which is different, Caboose has learned. There is bad ignoring, like a mean, angry, tall spiky wall, and there is good ignoring, which is like a smooth wall that will let him in if he yells loud enough. It’s not bad or awful. It isn’t because of anything he did.

Caboose likes it when he’s paid attention to, though. He just has to figure out what the right thing is to say to make Maine pay attention to him. He has to be more exciting than what Maine is doing right now, which is staring at his bedroom wall while feeling impatient and frustrated and angry and sad and confused and stupid and betrayed and used and tricked and bored. He doesn’t know how long he’s been doing this because Caboose got rid of his clock for a reason he can’t remember right now but which was probably great.

Caboose realizes that he’s still talking.

 _ <\--and my armor hugged me really, really tightly and then there was a really cool gun which I think is named Betsy…> _ He trails off, unsure of where he was going with that. He shrugs it off. _ <Do you want to go eat?> _

Maine doesn’t notice him.

_ <Do you want to go visit Florida Man and Sarge?> _

Maine continues to stew.

_ <Do you want to go and draw?> _

Maine stares at the wall.

Something even more exciting, then. He thinks about it. He thinks and thinks and thinks, gets distracted for a while thinking about all of the things that are more fun than a wall. Friends, robots, hide and seek, cookies…

Maine continues to just sit on his bed. It’s _so boring._

Caboose makes his hologram show up, his blue self facing Maine (helmet on). Maine blinks and looks at it.

“Do you want to go _sneak out?”_ he tries, pitching his voice up into a whisper.

Caboose feels Maine’s mind sit up and pay attention. His hologram bounces on its toes.

“We could go outside!” he says, caught up with the idea at the sliver of interest from Maine. “Off the ship! If we get in trouble we can just say that we got lost on our way to the bathroom.”

Maine’s mind cocks its head consideringly while his body head does not. He just stares.

“What do you want to do outside? Ooh, I want to go to a park! With cotton candy!”

Maine thinks about monsters. Big, tall things with maws that open up four ways. He thinks about cracking them open with his bare hands like a fish jaw when you’re taking it apart for all of the best parts to eat.

“We could do that!” Caboose agrees. It’s easy to do it right here in Maine’s familiar, quiet room. He’s never seen a monster on his own before. It might not be scary! And Maine’s killed so many, it’ll probably be fine. And maybe they could be friends with them! And maybe there’ll be cotton candy nearby the monsters.

Maine thinks. He thinks about jaws cracking. He thinks about staring at his wall. He thinks about promises. He thinks about doing something. He itches.

He nods and stands up. Caboose cheers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll be taking next Sunday off. Merry Christmas!


	37. fester

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “We’ve lost Agent Maine,” the Director starts with, and she forgets to breathe for a while.

Their orders are being delegated by the Director himself. All of them (everyone on the chart, everyone who’s worth something) are in the room for the briefing (except for one, but she’s fine that he’s not here, she won’t question it). Carolina stands as straight as she can and listens intently. A good, hard, important missions to ace is exactly what she needs right now. 

“We’ve lost Agent Maine,” the Director starts with, and she forgets to breathe for a while. 

_ “What?” _ York asks. 

The Director gives him a cold flick of his eyes, and York stands at attention. “Our cameras caught him taking an escape shuttle and leaving the ship less than twelve hours ago. He brought his gun rifle. He brought his armor. He brought my AI. This is unacceptable. That is priceless equipment. You will track him down and bring him back using any means necessary. He destroyed the trackers in his armor and the shuttle before he landed, but we’ve narrowed down his possible location to one solar system with only three planets. You will all be paired up and spread across these locations. You will find him ASAP. Is this understood?” 

Stunned silence. Carolina belatedly remembers to breathe. 

“Good,” he says, clipped, and walks out of the room. The Counselor, remaining behind, assigns everyone their partners. 

“Why did he leave?” she asks him, cutting him off before he tells her who her partner is. It’s a question that’s completely irrelevant to the mission. 

Everyone in the room that matters look at the Counselor, not saying anything, waiting for an answer. Carolina feels abruptly, intensely like a  _ part _ of the group. A unit. A team. It’s a disorienting, distracting feeling that makes her want to follow a dozen other threads (why didn’t she feel like a part of it before? Why does she now? Why does it feel so good? Why does she feel like she just got a drink of water after being stuck in a desert?) but she shrugs it off. The feeling mixes strangely with the strange dread of Maine inexplicably leaving. 

The Counselor smiles at her reassuringly. “We’ll find out once you retrieve him and we can question him.” 

“Maine’s a good agent,” she says. “He’s skilled, strong, dedicated.” He wouldn’t just  _ leave,  _ she doesn’t say, because it sounds childish and hurt. Except he did. Why? 

“You’re going to have to do your best to subdue him, then,” he says. That wasn’t what she had meant. 

 

Carolina gets sent to the most dangerous planet, of course. She’s number one. Florida is partnered up with her for reasons beyond her. He prefers solo missions. Or perhaps the Director just prefers to send him on solo missions; it doesn’t matter. What matters is that they’re going to be air dropped into an active war zone in less than five minutes and mission control has only narrowed down Maine’s possible location to one continent so far. And she can’t concentrate because Florida keeps talking to himself. 

Talking to his AI. She didn’t bother learning its--his-- the name. Wasn’t important. Still isn’t. The lack of knowledge is suddenly extremely hard to forget or ignore inside of her mind, like something lodged right underneath her skin, intrusive, and she can’t goddamned do anything about it because she can’t very well ask for Florida’s AIs name  _ now,  _ can she? At this point? After so long? 

This literally could not matter any less. She needs to stop thinking about this. 

“Florida,” she says, interrupting what seems to be a cheerful half heard argument about colors(?), “have you ever been in a warzone before?” 

“Why, yes,” he says pleasantly. The response was entirely expected. Florida has never said anything to indicate that he fought in the war, considering how focused Carolina is on Project Freelancer and how little they talk or interact at all. That, and she gets the feeling that Florida is very… present. Doesn’t dwell on the past. She barely knows him, though. She could be wrong. But anyways, he’s never said he fought in the war; but Carolina just looked at him and knew that he had. Some people are like that. He’s tall, muscular, strong, deadly, scarred, doesn’t flinch at death or violence. (She remembers his eager smile as he bludgeoned her face into something that hurt so much that she couldn’t feel it any longer. But that doesn’t matter--) Why  _ wouldn’t  _ he fight in the war? 

Which really just makes her feel stupid for asking. What, is she making smalltalk? Really? She didn’t do smalltalk back when she was in highschool, why is she doing it on an important mission? (Not college, she didn’t go to college. She applied just to see if she could, got accepted in school after school, looked at the letters and nodded, satisfied, and then threw them out in the garbage. College was just a waste of time. She’d always known where she’d end up, and she wouldn’t need a degree to get there. Just like her.) 

“It’ll be nice to revisit it,” Florida continues, nostalgic smile in his voice, like he’s reminiscing about visiting grandma’s farm as a kid during the summers. 

Carolina is suddenly struck by the disturbing thought of what Florida was like as a child, what his childhood was like, his _ family--  _

_ “‘Chutes on,”  _ 479er says.  _ “Or not. Up to you whether or not you want to splatter, I guess.”  _

“And you?” he asks as Carolina straps the pack to herself. 

“What?” she asks. 

A red little man flickers on at Florida’s soldier. “Did’ja fight the good fight, soldier!?” 

She had somehow not expected to be addressed by the AI, for him to appear at all. She blinks rapidly, clicks and fastens the buckles on herself on autopilot. “I… yes. I fought in the war too.” 

Briefly. She applied, she went through basic with flying colors, she got sent to the front lines, she killed, she excelled, and then the Director asked, in a rather impersonal email, if she wanted to volunteer in a personal project of his that had promise but which he would be supplying her no details with until she signed all of the contracts. 

It had been the most attention he’d paid her in years, the most directly he’d spoken to her and considered her. She hadn’t hesitated to reply in confirmation, and she’d been sent for and left her squad behind in less than a day, no time to even say goodbye and she hadn’t made a fuss about it. She’d just started to learn all of their ticks and quirks, had just earned her own nickname which had felt relevant enough at the time for her to still remember it now, for some reason. 

What she’s doing now is far more important than that. She made the right choice there at least, the obvious one. The Director still doesn’t pay much attention to her beyond what he has to, but if she weren’t here on the project, the amount of attention he would be required to pay her would be zero. Something is better than nothing. (Letting the wound fester in the desperate hope that it will get better against all logic and previous evidence instead of amputating the limb and moving on is better. Right? That’s how it works, right? She made the right choice, right? Of course she did. It was the obvious one. It was the exceptional one. The important one. She’s right.) 

“Good on you,” the AI says approvingly. The fact that she doesn’t know his name and can’t ask for it, lodged underneath her skin like a stone. Bugs her. She grits her teeth and shakes the irritation off. 

She’s got a mission to focus on. 

“We’re ready, Niner,” she says into her comms. 

_ “Copy,” _ she says, and the doors open. They’re going so fast and high that they don’t even need to jump. They’re sucked right out like it’s the vacuum of space. It isn’t though. They fall down to the surface like comets. 


	38. vacation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> By the fifth day, Florida lets the idea of treating the mission like work float happily away to the back of his head to be ignored, like a child letting their balloon float away up into the sky to never be seen again once they tire of holding onto the string.

By the fifth day, Florida lets the idea of treating the mission like work float happily away to the back of his head to be ignored, like a child letting their balloon float away up into the sky to never be seen again once they tire of holding onto the string. 

He feels Sarge’s urge to inhale, and does so, deeply. He briefly disengages the armor breath filters for it, since the readouts on his HUD are declaring the air around him safe to breathe for now. It’s not always the case around here, what with all of the smoke and chemical warfare wafting on the breeze. He inhales, and he smells fired guns and churned earth and bodies rotting in the summer heat. It smells like home. He stretches his back, pops his joints (careful to not stretch that last bit too far), and sighs, satisfied. 

“Ah, the smell of warfare,” Sarge says next to him. “Smells  _ natural.”  _

War is an entirely human thing. Or rather, human and alien. Florida isn’t sure that it exactly counts as natural. Or perhaps it does, with how naturally it comes to them all, across solar systems and cultures and even species. The great equalizer. 

Brahma is a planet that’s about half the size of earth. It’s been a warzone for less than a year. Florida looks across the landscape and has a hard time imagining it ever _ not  _ being a warzone. The buildings are bombed out husks covered in soot. The ground is mud that sucks at his boots as he walks. People stopped collecting the bodies from where they dropped months ago, by the smell of things, the odour of old meat and blood creeping out between the cracks of armor and kevlar and carapace. Rifles, ammo, and ration packs though, those are still being picked clean. Florida’s given each body he’s crossed a cursory poke, and he’s found nothing worth scavenging so far. 

“The weather isn’t natural,” he notes. 

It isn’t. It’s the height of summer for Brahma, and the skies have been nothing but solid grey clouds every second that he’s been here. Artificially induced to prevent drone attacks from the opposing side, apparently. Reports were unclear which side is defending from drones and which one is being thwarted. Both sides have plenty of their people deployed here, after all. 

Florida likes war. He likes the way it gives him an excuse to live and breathe the way he feels is right and not be punished for it. He likes being surrounded by people who are all throwing themselves into it alongside him. Likes the honest adrenaline thrill of a good, real fight. 

He likes sunshine too, though. At least his bedroom on the Mother of Invention had a UV bed lamp. 

He shakes his head, shakes off the burgeoning home sickness. He’s having fun. This is practically a vacation. He’s killed seven people so far. All aliens, because those are the rules. Kill all you want, Florida, just make sure that it’s the right people, okay? He can follow those rules. It’s pretty easy to tell the difference, after all. And even on the missions that don’t involve aliens, there’s always the convenient differences in armor colors and logos, like everyone who ever crafted a uniform decided to try and make it as simple as possible for everyone to know who they’re supposed to shoot. 

“Nothin’ unnatural about a little advanced warfare,” Sarge says. “Animals do it.” 

“Do they?” he asks. “Do squirrels commit psychological warfare? Do deer engage in propaganda?” 

“Do you have any evidence that they don’t?” 

“You’ve got me there.” He chuckles. 

_ “Have you found any supplies?”  _ Carolina’s voice asks him over the comms. She never says hello first. 

“Afraid not,” he replies. Another negative about the whole sky thing is that mission control can’t have extra supplies airdropped down to them. They hadn’t expected for the mission to last so long, so they’re running low on food. They’ve been rationing food for the last two days. Hunger nips at Florida’s belly, makes him feel lean and hungry, very conscious of his mouth and teeth and saliva, his hands and legs and muscles and gun, like he can hunt food down instead of scavenging for it. 

He could. The animal population in general is not doing very well at all on Brahma, being denied bomb shelters and gas masks and their unmolested ecosystems, but there are plenty of other living things scurrying around on the planet's surface, full of blood and meat and protein. 

He can’t though. Carolina. Maybe even Sarge. It’s not allowed, you’re not supposed to be caught doing that sort of stuff even if you have to do it. 

He grins and bears it. He’s gone through worse than a little bit of starvation. It lends the fights a certain extra edge to them, anyways. 

Carolina sighs into his ear. They’re separated to cover more ground, both in searching for food and Maine. It had been Carolina’s own suggestion. He’s sure that his unceasing, constant cheerful humming had had nothing to do with it. He belatedly starts humming, and he thinks he can hear her teeth start to grind through the comms. Honestly, such a poor habit! 

_ “Heading further south,”  _ she says, tight annoyance at the edges of her voice. _ “Call me if you find anything.”  _

And then she hangs up without saying goodbye either. He shakes his head. 

“Some people just don’t have manners,” he says. “Who raised her, a pack of wolves?” 

Sarge barks a laugh. 

And then Florida finds something. Spots it. He tends to go on solo missions; it’s what he prefers, and what the Director prefers to assign him to. He works better alone, unhindered, free to do whatever he thinks is best. Sometimes Wyoming comes with him, but just to hang back and watch his back with his sniper rifle. Wyoming isn’t easily scandalized, despite being British. He’s a good teammate. 

But he can recognize the marks left behind by Maine’s highly distinctive weapon, at the very least. It’s a one of a kind. Large slash marks and explosions left behind in bodies and carapace and the ground and dead trees and husks-of-buildings and various detritus, leaving a destructive trail in its wake. 

He’s finally found Agent Maine’s trail. 

“You noticed somethin’?” Sarge asks him, reacting to whatever his brain just did. 

Florida has seen the way Simmons and York talk to each other. It’s hard to follow, even when Simmons is outside of York’s head and vocalizing for everyone to hear. They keep reading each other perfectly. They probably wouldn’t need words at all to have a whole conversation. They’re the most extreme example, but he’s seen something of the same in all of the others. And Sarge can read Florida’s thoughts too. Sometimes. A bit. Faintly. 

Florida doesn’t know if the fault lies with him or Sarge, but it doesn’t really matter either. What matters is that he could lie, right now, and probably get away with it. He’s taken polygraph tests before. His heart doesn’t so much as flicker at the most outrageous of lies. 

He considers it. War. His UV lamp. Fighting. Hunger. Violence. Sleeping out of his armor, not on the ground. Blood and adrenaline and wrestling something large and screeching down the ground. Pros and cons. When he puts it like that, the choice sounds easy. Is he really so tamed, after all, that he’d give up what satisfies him above anything else just to be  _ comfortable?  _ Ridiculous. A bit of pain is worth a lot of joy. He’s always known this. It’s why he relishes the injuries his opponents give him while he kills them. Blood in his mouth for blood under his nails. 

The Director will be expecting results, though. Think long term, Florida. Don’t get caught up in the heat of the moment. You’ll do something stupid and get caught, discovered, exposed, punished. Follow the rules and be allowed to stay in society. Where else is there to live, but in society? Fit in enough to stay or die. 

He can feel Sarge missing his friends, too, a sort of longing that Florida only ever feels for things and concepts, not people. Adorable. 

“Yes,” he says, and makes a call. 

“Hello,” he says, as soon as Carolina accepts his call, which is a fraction of a second after he made it. 

“What,” she says, impatient but not dismissive. Eager, desperate. She wants out. He doesn’t think that she likes it here as much as he does, even if he’s sure that she could tolerate and survive and thrive in anything. She’s got the presence of a true predator to her, although not quite the same as Florida, even though he can’t quite put his finger on how. She’s hostile, she’s smug, she’s dangerous. She never relaxes, though. Never just  _ enjoys _ herself. That must be it. How miserable. “Did you find something?” 

She wants to please the Director, too. Another way they’re the same, but just slightly off. Her want to please him is different than his, somehow. He doesn’t bother thinking about it. She’s not that interesting. Not fun. Not necessary to his survival. 

“I did,” he says, and gives her his coordinates. 

 

They follow the trail. The presence of alien corpses become more concentrated as they pursue it, all of them covered in the wounds that could only come from a knifle. Carolina walks fast, eager and impatient. Florida imagines her dragging Maine to the Director’s feet like a cat with a dead bird. 

His HUD informs him that the air is becoming dangerously toxic. He reactivates his filters, having entirely forgotten them. Warfare really does smell natural. 

They turn a corner, enter a burned out husk of a building by way of an entire missing wall, only concrete walls left standing. 

There he is. 

Maine’s lying down on the ground. His armor is caked in mud and blood. His knifle is in his hand, covered in gore. He’s surrounded by over a dozen aliens, all dead. Blaze of glory, defiant last stand. It’s very impressive. 

His golden helmet has been broken, caved in, a hole revealing his shaved head. Florida’s HUD says that the air is lethal here. Maine doesn’t so much as twitch. 

Florida keeps walking for a few steps before he realizes that Carolina has stopped dead in her tracks ten feet away from Maine. He looks back at her. She doesn’t move. He shrugs and keeps approaching the body. Pokes it in the side with his foot. Dead, unresponsive weight. 

“Hey!” he says, bright and pleased. “He’s still got his rations on him! Two in one.” 

Sarge doesn’t say anything. Carolina still hasn’t moved. 

He crouches down and retrieves the rations, thinks. What was it the Director had wanted back? Armor, weapon, AI. Taking back the whole body sounds like a pain… The armor, too. Maybe they can just bring the weapon and the AI? That’s fine, right? Those are the most important. Florida’s sure that Maine’s armor can be recreated. It’s fine. Who would even wear it, anyways? It had to be specially made for his large frame. 

He twists Maine’s head to the side, gropes along his neck, slips his fingers along the neck seam on the kevlar suit and feels around until his fingers find the familiar bumps and edges of the neck implant. He takes ahold of the small chip that is Caboose. 

“This probably won’t hurt him, right?” he asks. He makes his voice concerned, because that’s always the tone that you should use with questions like that, he’s found. 

No one says anything. He’ll take that as agreement. 

He yanks Caboose out of the dead brain he’s been stuck in for who knows how many days now like he’s a rotten tooth. Grabs the knifle with his other hand. Stands up, flipping the chip up in the air like it’s a coin to be fiddled and played with. Walks towards Carolina, past her. She still hasn’t moved. 

He thinks about his UV lamp, and the cafeteria, and his bed, and the showers. Playing around on a warzone for a few days was fun, but all vacations have to end eventually. Coming home is always a relief, no matter how much fun you had during. 

“Let mission control know that they can pick us up now?” he asks, not looking back at Carolina as he walks. “Mission success.” 


	39. stay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Suddenly, dark. Suddenly, quiet. Nothing but him in the dark quiet.

Caboose hadn’t noticed how _ sparkly  _ Maine’s brain was until it stopped. Like all of the stars in the sky all of a sudden going dark like the sky was just a big birthday cake and someone very, very big blew out all of the candles all on the first try. Like a city during the night, all lights in windows and signs and screens, pretty, until a blackout happens and the whole place goes dark at the same time. Like blinking but then the world doesn’t come back when you open your eyes again. 

There had been light and noise and thoughts and feelings, and it all had been kind of scary to be honest because Maine was really hurt and really angry, but then it had all  _ gone away.  _ Suddenly, dark. Suddenly, quiet. Nothing but him in the dark quiet. 

He’s never been somewhere like this before. It’s nothing like being logged off. That had felt like sleeping, like mindlessly dwelling in his code, peaceful and quiet. He’s inside Maine’s neck, creeping up into his spine and brain and nerves through that opening, except Maine  _ isn’t there.  _ He’s trapped and alone and awake in the nothing and he can’t see and he can’t hear and he can’t feel and he can’t move and he can’t talk to anyone and he can’t see how much time is going, what’s happening, if anything is happening at all. 

He must’ve gotten lost. Slipped through a hole in the world and fallen away. He has to get back home (home is a friend) but he doesn’t know how, he doesn’t have a map or directions or

  
  
  


“Son,” Sarge says, “I’m gonna give you the flare gun so that the next time you wander off and can’t find your way back you can just sit your keister down and point and shoot this at the sky y’hear me?” 

“Sir,” Simmons says, “Won’t the enemy be able to find him too?” 

“But, ah, I don’t want to shoot at the sky,” Caboose says. “It’s never hurt me. I mean, sure, it’s hailed on me, but those were the clouds? So we’re okay.” 

“We are  _ not _ giving our only flare gun to Caboose,” Grif says. 

“Just shoot your normal gun at the sky then,” Sarge says. 

“Sir--!” Simmons protests. 

“Guys, guys!” Donut laughs like they’re all being stupid. “This silly argument doesn’t matter! Because I already fired off our only flare last night.” 

“You did WHAT--!?” 

  
  
  


“Caboose,” Tucker snaps, worried-angry-annoying, “you idiot, you were walking further away from us the entire time, just sit your ass down and wait next time, alright?” 

  
  
  


“Michael,” mom says, “if you ever get lost like that again just stay where you are, okay? Your sisters will find you.” 

  
  
  


Right. Right. He just has to stay where he is and then someone will find him sooner or later. 

It’s good that he doesn’t have legs anyways, then. 

Caboose stays where he is. 

He stays. 

He stays and stays and stays stays stays stays stays stays stays strays stray cats he likes cats even when they scratch him because they think he pets them too hard and he wishes that the ship had a cat maybe then less people would be so grumpy all of the time and he should go look for a cat, he should go, he should move, walk-- 

He doesn’t have legs. There is nowhere to run because he got lost in nothing. Right. He has to wait for home (a friend) to come back to him this time. He can do that! This will be fine. 

  
  
  


“--just fuckin’ typical that I’m gonna die on some backwater planet I can’t even remember the name of with mosquitos coming outta its ass,” Grif says. 

“Grif!” Simmons snaps. “Stop being so morbid! And they’re not mosquitos, they just share superficial similarities due to having once been mosquitos over a thousand years ago, but they’ve significantly diverged in their evolution from that species since, and also the planet’s name is--” 

“Someone kill me,” Tucker muttered. 

“Someone will,” Grif says flatly. 

_ “I  _ will,” Simmons snarls. 

“The mosquitos are gonna kill me,” Tucker says. “Sorry,  _ super _ mosquitos.” 

Caboose, at the back of the line, hums in tune with a buzzing bug in the air, watching it fly in loops and loops and loops in the air. 

“We’re wearing armor,” Simmons says, “We’ll be  _ fine.” _

“We’re not gonna be fine,” Grif says, bored and casual in his voice but sad and tired in his slumped shoulders and hanging head. 

Caboose harmonizes with the bug as it dances in the air, humming-- 

Donut claps so abruptly that Caboose yelps and trips, squishing the bug between his hands. “Got one!” he says cheerfully, opening his hands and showing the dead, bloody smear on his gloves and

  
  
  


There is pain and he can’t move and Sarge is shouting and Tucker is yelling and Donut sounds scared and he can’t move as the pain shoots around like lightning stuck in a bottle and the bottle is his body and

  
  
  


He can’t move. He tries, but he’s stuck-- no. There’s just nothing to move. Because he doesn’t have a body. Because he’s a chip, wires and circuitry and lightning, all so very, very small. He is trapped inside of Maine’s empty body (inside a rotting brain, wires sparking electricity into meat that won’t spark back like it’s supposed to) and he has to stay where he is until friendhome finds him and things can stop being scary. 

Caboose… wishes that he hadn’t snuck out with Maine. It wasn’t fun. Maine wasn’t happy. There wasn’t cotton candy. It was scary and now he can’t move and he wasn’t able to move before but it was  _ different.  _ He could talk and hear and see through Maine and so it was fine if he couldn’t swing his feet or poke at something when he felt like it, really. It was fine. Living in your friend’s head is great! Except for when they’re not at home. 

Caboose hopes that Maine comes back soon and finds him. 

He wonders how long he’s been lost in the dark for. 

He wonders how long until someone finds him. 

He wonders who will find him. 

It’s going to be okay. He knows that he’s going to be okay. It’s scary now but it’ll be fine, everything’s going to be fine. 

  
  
  


_ screaming  _

  
  
  


He knows that everything is definitely going to be okay soon he just wishes that it would happen  _ now, _ please, he’s ready for things to be okay again now, it can happen right now that’s fine. 

There is nothing in the dark, except for when there’s something. Caboose, but not this Caboose, not him. Something from somewhere else. 

Bad things. He doesn’t want to think about them. 

But there’s nothing else here. He can’t stop thinking about

  
  
  


_ “STOP IT,” _ Tucker says, so loudly he can hear it over the ringing sound in his ears and he doesn’t know who he’s shouting at or what he wants to stop or where he is because his mind’s spinning too fast and dizzy for him to remember what’s happening, there’s just his nerves underneath his skin vibrating like a funny bone struck wrong across his entire body and

  
  
  


that, he needs to stop thinking about that, he doesn’t want to, but there’s nothing else, what does he do, what can he do

  
  
  


“Don’t even think about it,” Sarge says, angry, not fake angry or happy angry or embarrassed angry,  _ angry _ angry

  
  
  


“Take his helmet off.”

 

(he just)

 

“I’m the Counselor.”

 

(needs to stay)

 

“What are you doing!?”

 

(where he is)

 

“Oh my god oh my god oh my god.”

 

(until a friend)

 

“What are they doing?”

 

(until home)

 

“That’s enough. Next.” 

 

(finds him)

  
  
  


It’s a long long long long long long time until someone roughly rips all of his wires out from the dead meat and he shuts down just like that. 


	40. grief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “And how does that make you feel?” Aiden Price asks.

“And how does that make you feel?” Aiden Price asks.

“It doesn’t make me _feel--_ I’m not emotional over it or anything,” Agent South says, mouth grimacing around the world ‘feel’, like it’s a nasty word. Nothing new there. “Like, sure, I’m not happy about it, of course, I’m not a freak. He was fine. Not annoying. But we weren’t close. He barely spoke even before he caught a bullet in the throat.”

She has her arms crossed, but her hands are clutching tight at her elbows and her arms are lower down than usual, making the gesture look more defensive and insecure than the usual hostile menace the gesture is meant to convey. Her jaw is clenched, her brow furrowed, and she keeps fidgeting in her seat. Disconcerted, twitchy, bothered. Small signs of _emotional_ seeping through the angry wall she puts up.

“It’s normal to be disturbed after the death of someone in your life, even if you didn’t share a significant bond. You and Agent Maine saw each other daily. Sparred, ate together, protected each others lives during missions. It wouldn’t be strange for you to be upset.”

If he wanted to avoid putting her on the defensive, he should’ve used the word ‘agitated’ instead of ‘upset’. Both more or less interchangeable in context so his meaning would come across, except that she’d be able to admit to being agitated more easily than upset. She associates anger with strength and sadness with weakness, and it is absolutely vital to her to make sure that people view her as strong and intimidating. The end result is that most people view her as an asshole.

Price’s job isn’t to fix these people, though, so he says _upset_ instead.

“I’m not upset,” she says, firm and heavy as a rock, eyes narrowing at him. “I’m not even surprised. Job like this? One of us was bound to die sooner or later. Fuck, he isn’t even the first Freelancer to die. Just the first one on the leaderboard. So what? I’m already over it.”

“Are you certain?” he asks, just to make her double down.

 _“I’m sure,”_ she says, glaring.

Agent South is the kind of person who’d rather be wrong for the rest of her life than admit to ever not being right. After making a firm declaration like that, she’s taken care of.

“That’s good to hear,” he says pleasantly, and crosses her off the list.

 

“And how does that make you feel?”

“Jealous?” Agent Florida says, a smile on his face. Price has categorized it as the smile he wears when he thinks he’s making pleasant but unimportant small talk. Time with a counselor isn’t exactly the time for small talk, except from what Price has read of Butch Flowers’ past, he’s learned from hard experience to never talk about anything important or personal with therapists.

Except, of course, that he _is_ talking something important and personal at the moment, and has before in the past. He just doesn’t know it. It’s as if he thinks that if he just adopts a casual and friendly expression and tone that no one will notice the contents of his words, like talking to animals or infants. The contrasts just highlights it instead. He’s had many patients with lacking social abilities before. It’s very convenient, having such a large upper hand on the patient.

“Because he died?” Death wishes are relevant information. They can be positive or negative, encouraging the afflicted person to take greater risks but also to possibly fail where they could’ve avoided it just for the chance to die. If Agent Florida wants to die, they’ll have to change the sorts of missions they send him on.

Agent Florida laughs like Price had just made a joke, even going to far as to slap at his knee in mirth. “Heavens no! Of course not. I love being alive. It’s very fun. I just meant the _way_ he died. I’d never die if I got the choice, but it’s inevitable, so I at least want for my death to be a good one, like his.”

“Alone and desperate?”

“Do you think that’s how he felt?” he asks, curious.

“He was horrendously outnumbered, injured, and stranded on a wartorn planet with no hope or prospects of getting off of it.”

Agent Florida smiles, and it doesn’t reach his eyes. Some of his smiles reaches his eyes, and they tend to be the toothier ones. This one is just polite in a way that makes Price think that it’s hiding confusion, with how he’s tilting his head like a befuzzled puppy.

“He died fighting,” Agent Florida says. “Killing. Doing as much violence as possible.”

“So you’re not upset?”

“Can you be more specific?”

“Angry? Scared? Sad?” Indignant on Agent Maine’s behalf? Worried for his own life? Hopeless about the Project?

Agent Florida goes from Pleasant Smile #4 to Crestfallen Frown #2 with neat and quick precision. “Of course I’m sad,” he says, not quite hitting the mark of ‘this is so unfortunate’ as well with his voice, but it's a serviceable simulacrum. “My coworker died.”

Agent Florida has learned to always be sad when someone he knows died. No reservations, no emotions more complicated than simple grief. Little Butch Flowers, given a mandatory therapy session after his mother had died when he was a child and he’d found the body, hadn’t yet learned this lesson and had instead just honestly, earnestly reassured the therapist that no, he didn’t particularly mind the change because he’d found a cookbook and learned to make his favorite breakfast food just as well as his mom had, and no the memory didn’t haunt him, his father had cleaned the kitchen so that the smell was already gone, although now it stunk of bleach instead.

Butch Flowers had learned his lesson firmly, even if he’d probably never learned the _reason_ why everyone was so upset at his honesty. Price had noted that he seemed to do many things without seemingly realizing why he had to do them, and therefore sometimes got them slightly, unsettlingly wrong, like the uncanney valley of emotional health. Being used to following orders without reasons given does make for an excellent Freelancer, though.

“But why should I be angry or scared?”

“No reason,” Price says. “I’m sure you’ll work through your understandable grief in an appropriate and tasteful timeframe, Agent Florida.”

“I’m so glad to hear it,” he says, back to the exact same polite smile.

Price doesn’t try to coax any truth out of him, and instead just crosses his name off the list. There hadn’t been much doubt over him anyways, but better safe than sorry.

 

“And how does that make you feel?”

 _“Devastated,”_ Agent Wyoming says. “Massachusetts was a dear friend of mine.”

“Maine,” Price corrects.

“Ah, right,” Wyoming says. “Slip of the tongue.”

Price smiles and nods and crosses Wyoming off the list.

 

“And how does that make you feel?”

“Not good,” Agent York admits. He fidgets underneath Price’s steady stare. He hadn’t used to do that, before the AI implantation. Price assumes that it’s anxiety disorder by proxy. He noted it down in his file already, but Agent York hasn’t let it affect his performance in the field yet, so. It doesn’t really matter. Quality of life only matters as far as it affects functionality. “Maine was my friend.”

“The two of you were close?”

“Of course. I’d say that I’m close to all of the Freelancers.”

“How so?”

“We’re a team. We live together. We share a secret.”

“Those are important things to you?”

“Yeah, course.”

York is one of Price’s less… _interesting_ patients. Not any particular eccentricities or interesting coping mechanisms or brain maladies. The new anxiety disorder has only been an improvement, even filtered through the AI first. Nothing exciting that would warp a human beings mind on his files either. York’s past is sparse and bland on paper, not a single thing that Price could point to and call a trauma or proof of a broken mind (or better yet, broken and healed wrong, like a bone that wasn’t set correctly after damage, leading to new and fascinating shapes that a human should never take). Mother, father, no dysfunctional siblings or relationships or divorces or suspicious hospital visits. No rap sheet. Kindergarten, elementary, middle, and high school, followed by enlistment to the army immediately after graduation after being targeted by a predatory recruiter, an utterly normal and unexciting story. Agent York had adjusted to the army in a normal and healthy way from what Price can tell, not that there’s much to tell from. There’s very little information on Agent York’s mental state, purely because he’s been so stable his entire life that no one has bothered to poke at it and look around.

It’s a bit unprofessional to say, but he’s _boring._ The kind of patient Price went into secret illegal military projects to avoid in the first place. He hadn’t even been able to make himself read the entire file, as thin as it was. But it’s fine. He can tolerate one sane patient in exchange for all of the rest of them.

“Do you think you can elaborate on ‘not good’?”

“Sad?” He sounds like he thinks the question is stupid, but he’s too polite to say so.

Not scared then. Not suddenly confronted by his own mortality over the death of someone so close to his own level of skill, not looking to get out of the Project and cause a big mess in need of cleaning up. Price can work with sad. It’s nothing to be alarmed by. He crosses Agent York off the list.

 

“And how does that make you feel?”

“It’s not the first time I’ve lost a teammate,” Agent Connecticut says. Her face is blank, at odds with how focused her eyes are on him. She’s become increasingly more closed off during sessions with him. He’s tried to stop it, and failed. Now he just watches it, distantly interested in what the end result will turn out to be. “I’ll deal.”

She’s even more closed off than usual. Disingenuous, giving him empty answers. She doesn’t want to share herself with him.

Price nods, making approving noises, and doesn’t cross her off the list. It’ll be for the best to keep an eye on her.

 

“And how does that make you feel?”

“Bad,” Agent Washington says.

“I’m sorry to hear that, David.”

“You can just call me Wash,” he tells him. “Everyone calls me Wash.”

This isn’t the first time Price has been told this. He’s just curious about this strange and elusive temper Agent Washington apparently has. It’s landed him in hot trouble more than once, to the point of getting written down in his file multiple times, but he hasn’t witnessed it yet on the Mother of Invention, and he hasn’t been able to subtly provoke him into it yet either.

He smiles and doesn’t respond in a way that he hopes will annoy Agent Washington, will dig underneath his skin and simmer there and cause some interesting chemical interactions sooner or later. “Bad how?”

“Mad, I guess.”

“Oh?” He perks up for a moment, and then reigns himself back. Cool, composed, calm.

“I didn’t see Maine leaving coming at all. I don’t get why he did it. How he could’ve just--” He bites the sentence off with no prompting from Price. He knows this, because he’s carefully sitting still, intently watching.

“... It wasn’t very good of him, was it,” he says slowly, instead of assuring Agent Washington that it surely wasn’t personal, wasn’t meant to be cruel. “To just leave like that without another word, forever.”

Agent Washington hunches his shoulders. “I… I thought we were friends.”

“People can let you down sometimes. Abandoning his teammates-- you could even call it selfish.”

Agent Washington shifts, uncomfortable, but he doesn’t jump to the late Agent Maine’s defense either.

“Growth can be taken from loss, however,” he says, because a counselor is supposed to be constructive, and he knows an opportunity when he sees it. “You can take this as a lesson and become better for it. Don’t make the same mistake Agent Maine made. See where it got him, and where it got his teammates. Nowhere better, certainly.”

“I’d never leave the Project like that,” Agent Washington says, low and fierce. “Never.”

Price smiles. Maine’s death is now his fault, his betrayal, Agent Washington’s morality lesson. Don’t betray the Project, or else you’ll hurt your team the way he did. Feel guilt for your friends every time you think about turning against this organization, as if they’re the same thing. It also conveniently turns his mind off the tracks of perhaps thinking about _why_ Agent Maine left so abruptly, instead thoughtlessly chalking it up as a character failing. Price hadn’t realized that things had gotten so dire with him. He blames the language barrier for his lack of notice.

Agent Washington sits and broods silently. Price wonders if he’s talking to his AI quietly, but it’s unlikely. According to all of the Freelancers, the AIs can be very quiet things, except for Caboose who seemed to be a bit of an anomaly. Price blamed the brain damage on that. AI technology hinges very much on delicate neuroscience that they still don’t entirely understand to this day, after all. Also, according to the cameras around the ship, Agent Washington subvocalized even when he was trying to quietly talk to his AI.

Agent Washington was well taken care of, in the dark and in hand as usual. He crosses him off the list.

 

“And how does that make you feel?”

“Losses happen on the battlefield,” Agent North says. _No use crying over spilled milk,_ his tone says. _No use crying over the inevitable._

“So you’re not sad?”

“I didn’t say that. It’s pretty senseless, actually. If he just hadn’t gone down there without backup…”

“Teamwork is equal survival?”

“Isn’t it?”

“It’s an interesting philosophy.”

“I think it’s reality. Maine went in alone, and he died. It’s as simple as that.”

No indications that he wants to leave the Project, then.

“Mission control never would’ve sent him into a place like that without teammates,” he confirms. Unless they were trying to get rid of him, of course. In which case they would’ve pulled Caboose from his head first anyways.

“I know. You guys value the people on the top, give us good equipment and intel.”

No indications of resentment towards the Project, either.

“Was that a problem you had before joining the Project?”

“Yeah, actually. We were all the same soldier, in commands eyes. Interchangeable and equally unimportant. Here, you _support_ your field agents, because you’ve already gone to all of the trouble of choosing the best of the best.”

No indications of fearing for his life. Good, good.

Price nods, and doesn’t really dwell on what they do to the worst of the best, once they didn’t improve and ran out of chances. It isn’t important. He idly crosses Agent North off of the list and continues the session.

 

“And how does that--”

Agent Carolina gets up and slams the door behind her.

“Well,” Price says to the audience of no one but him and his camera. He turns it off. Agent Carolina has never been fond or particularly patient with the therapy sessions, tending to apparently view them as a waste of her time, but she’s always been professional enough to play along for the minimum amount of time. At least not to storm out without another word. He’ll have to try and schedule another session with her to try again, as soon as there’s an opening in her schedule.

Given her coping mechanisms, it’ll be a long while.


	41. forget

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> York’s eye snaps open.

Grif is making eyes at his rations, and _ like fuck  _ he’s going to share them. He gets a protective, sharp elbow up in the way and starts eating faster, glaring over at him. 

Grif notices his subtle body language somehow. “Man, I’m just _ looking.”  _

He narrows his eyes further because one, that’s always how it  _ starts,  _ and two, he’s not going to eat with his mouth full like  _ some _ people he could name. 

“That was one time!” he yelps, understanding his meaning easily. “You weren’t even gonna eat what I took, I saw how you were picking at it.” 

He neatly swallows and then takes another bite. 

“You know, sharing is caring,” Grif says. “Didn’t anyone ever teach you that?” 

Oh, so he was _ just looking _ but now he was whining about sharing? Which one was it? Huh? 

“I wouldn’t  _ have _ to steal if you’d  _ share.”  _

Have to!? No one was making him! 

_ “You’re--!”  _

“God, love is creepy,” Tucker says. 

He and Grif both turn their heads at the same time to look at him. 

“You do know that he hasn’t said a single word this entire time, right? How are you understanding him?” 

“Mindreading,” Sarge says confidently. 

“I think it is because he is blinking in Morse code,” Caboose says. 

“Grif’s too dumb to learn a second language,” Sarge dismisses. 

“I know  _ three--”  _ Grif starts. 

“Boys, boys, boys,” Donut says with fond condescension, like a pat on the head. “It’s not any of those things, or anything on this plane at all. It’s because their zodiacs are complimentary!” 

_ “I  _ don’t even know what my zodiac is,” Grif says. 

“Zodiacs are nonsense!” he breaks his silence to say indignantly. “That’s not science, Donut--” 

Grif takes the opportunity to steal the last bite of his rations. He gasps in outrage and lunges for him and knocks him onto the ground, trying to wrestle the food out of his mouth, much like with a dog that’s snatched your chocolate out of your hand. Grif barely chews and swallows with an infuriatingly smug look. 

Tucker and Donut have to rip York off of him while Sarge just sits back and cheers. 

They forget to correct

  
  
  


York’s eye snaps open. 


	42. paragon of carefully considered thought and rightness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Grif and Simmons,” he says, with a bone deep confidence, “used to know each other. North, I’ve got the whole thing figured out! Puzzle solved! Dots connected! The dreams, North, the weird missing time!” He slaps his own thigh, grinning madly with quite a lot of teeth. There’s a slight red sheen to his eyes.

North woke up two hours ago. He woke up, his alarm rang shrilly two minutes, Grif made a whining, pleading noise inside of his head that he doesn’t think can even be meaningfully replicated in a way that will communicate the same sentiment to someone who doesn’t literally share a brain with the speaker, and North turned off the alarm, rolled over, and went back to sleep. 

He’s been dozing for a long time now, hazy and warm and relaxed. He’s going to have to catch up on this lost time later by eating faster than comfortable, skipping out on half an hour of sleep here and there, cutting out some of his time which he just spends socializing, catching up with his teammates and playing cards or anything that doesn’t count as training. He’s normally very disciplined, good at keeping long term consequences in mind and not laying all of his problems at ‘future’ North’s shoulders, as if they’re not the exact same person. But he’s always been better at treating others than treating himself, and this is honestly _ very _ nice. He hasn’t slept in since he was a teenager. 

Grif hums in the back of his skull, content like a fat cat sprawled in a sunbeam. North basks in the simple peace of the moment. 

And then his door opens, and before it’s even shut again someone’s ripping the covers off of him and jumping on top of him. 

_ <Cold!> _ Grif yelps, unpleasantly startled. North is  _ violently  _ startled. He punches the person on top of him in the face, before it registers that it’s York. York, who isn’t even in armor. Who isn’t even in  _ pants.  _ Or a shirt. Or anything but what North suspects that he went to sleep in, which is a pair of red boxer shorts. 

“Arg!” York says. “Watch it! I’ve only got the one eye!” 

“Sorry.” And then what York is wearing finally registers for him. Or rather, what he _ isn’t  _ wearing. “Did you walk all the way here from your room just in _ that?”  _

“Simmons likes the color,” York says defensively, which was _ not _ what North meant, but he raises his eyebrows at that all the same. “And I ran.” 

“Now  _ everyone’s _ going to think we’re-- fraternizing.” 

“It’s fine, Carolina doesn’t gossip at all, she’s terrible at small talk or seeming approachable. Not that Carolina would have a personal stake in whether or not I’m having an affair with you-- look, that doesn’t matter!” 

“You’re the one who brought her up,” he points out. That’s usually the case, actually. York likes talking about Carolina, and looking at her, and standing in her general vicinity. It’s too bad for him that Carolina never stands still for long, like a shark that’ll stop breathing if it stops moving forward. 

_ <It’s only an affair if you’re already dating someone,> _ Grif points out to the appreciation of no one but himself. 

“Maybe _ I _ don’t want for the entire ship to think that we’re seeing each other, York.” 

“North!” York says with more manic energy than North has ever seen in him before. It’s outright out of character, really. “That! Doesn’t! Matter!” 

_ Well fuck me I guess, _ he thinks and doesn’t say. Grif snickers. 

“We figured it out,” York breathes, eyes wide and crazy. 

_ <Like he’s Gollum and we’re the Ring,> _ Grif says. 

“Why do you only know old movies,” North whispers. 

_ <It’s a classic!> _

Maybe it’s because Lord of the Rings copyright had expired hundreds of years ago. Had the Director only downloaded uncopyrighted media onto the AIs? Why? They were a  _ secret  _ military project. Even Disney-Exxon-Apple’s long arm couldn’t touch them, probably. 

“North!” York says, shaking him by the shoulders, still sitting on top of him after having burst into his room without knocking or a warning or explanation of any kind. Or pants. “I said we figured it out! Me and Simmons!” 

“Figured what out?” he asks, like he’s supposed to. York looks briefly mollified before the frantic  _ eureka _ expression slips back on his face, like a mad scientist having an incredible and terrible revelation, or a sleep deprived detective triumphantly shouting  _ I’ve got it  _ in front of their messy, insane conspiracy board comprised of newspaper cut outs and tacks and yarn when a google doc would have done just fine and been much neater and less expensive besides. 

“Grif and Simmons,” he says, with a bone deep confidence, “used to know each other. North, I’ve got the whole thing figured out! Puzzle solved! Dots connected! The  _ dreams,  _ North, the weird missing time!” He slaps his own thigh, grinning madly with quite a lot of teeth. There’s a slight red sheen to his eyes. 

_ <This… sounds more like Simmons than York.> _

“They used to be  _ people,  _ North.” York leans down so that they’re eye to eye. “And then they  _ died.”  _

“What?” 

“I’m sorry, Simmons,” York says. “Of course you’re still a person, that was robot racist of me. I meant humans, they used to be humans who then DIED.” York leans in further so that their noses almost touch. North can’t lean away. He tries not to wrinkle his nose; York hasn’t had the time to brush his teeth yet. “And then they reincarnated.” 

North doesn’t say anything. 

“As AI.” 

Grif doesn’t say anything. 

“Because they’re lovers.” 

“York,” North finally says with careful slowness. “How long ago did you wake up?” 

“Two minutes and thirty two seconds ago,” he says promptly enough that he’s certain that Simmons immediately fed him the answer. 

“That’s an impressive run time,” is his first response. 

“Thank you,” York says sincerely. 

North regathers his thoughts. “York, do you remember that time you dreamt that we were pirates and that you owed me a bag of rubies and then half an hour after you woke up you apologized to me for not having the bag of rubies ready yet because a dog ate them? Because you hadn’t had your coffee yet?” 

York thinks. “Maybe.” 

“Do you think that this is like that?” 

“No,” York says. “Absolutely not. Simmons thinks that I’m right too.” 

_ <Ah, yes, Simmons,> _ Grif says.  _ <That paragon of carefully considered thought and rightness.> _

It’s a bit mean, but North agrees. Silently. In his head. 

“In fact, this was all Simmons’ idea,” York goes on. 

<There  _ we go,> _ Grif says. 

“Ah,” North says. 

The thing is, York  _ really _ isn’t ever really like this. This all being some weird effect of his AI bleeding over into his mind while he slept and him having a hard time shaking the irrational mania off along with his grogginess in the morning makes far more sense than, well, _ anything  _ that just came out of York’s mouth. He’s going to be incredibly embarrassed about this later once he comes to his senses. North will very politely not make fun of him for it and very kindly just smile at him silently instead and York will  _ die. _ It’s going to be hilarious. 

He smiles up at York, gives him a friendly pat on the arm, and sits up and stretches. It’s about time to start the day anyways. 

York stares at him like he’s the one being strange. North gently shoves him off of himself and onto the bed, and stands up to get dressed. 

“--lutely no way OH MY GOD NORTH YOU FUCKER,” South says, opening his door and poking her head in. He sighs and doesn’t even try to berate her for not knocking. She hasn’t knocked on a door in her life and trying to get her to start now is just a fine way to get on her nerves and still get nothing done. Not knocking is her lifestyle. 

“Good morning, South.” 

“Told you so,” CT says, peeking into the room around South’s arm, too short to look over her shoulder. “479er told me she saw it with her own eyeballs.” 

“NORTH,” South says, her face a mask of betrayed horror.  _ “How could you!?”  _

“I really thought that York was sleeping with Carolina. I had a lot of money riding on that,” CT says mournfully. 

“Carolina’s too good for York,” South snaps at her, before turning back on North. “And I thought  _ you  _ were too!” 

“Aw, thanks, South.” 

“Oh my gosh,” Donut says, appearing. “Are you in _ love? _ Is it passionate? Is it--?” 

_ “I’m leaving!”  _ South shouts, and does so. CT waves, and then the door shuts again. 

North turns back to York.  _ “You’re _ clearing that mess up.” 

North doesn’t actually really mind. The general atmosphere has been a bit…  _ glum, _ since Maine. If this is what it takes to distract people, then he’ll take it. Plus, he’s had to deal with fake rumours before, like most human beings ever. The MOI can be eerily like highschool sometimes, except the physical fights aren’t as pathetic. 

York is staring off into the distance with a disturbed look on his face. “Reincarnated… lovers? Jesus Christ, I  _ believed  _ that.” 

“There you go,” he says. “Now I’d tell to leave my room, but I’ve got a feeling that there’s a bit of a crowd out there now just sort of casually loitering around coincidentally in this part of the ship, so maybe wait for a bit first. Or borrow a pair of my pants. Or would that be worse?” 

“Simmons, what the hell,” York says, still ignoring him. 

“Oh! And good morning, York, Simmons.” And he smiles and leaves. 

Grif grumbles until North gives in and promises him some extra breakfast. 


	43. theory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “York,” South says, oozing threat from every inch of her posture. “You better watch yourself.”
> 
> “Um, wh-- oh my god.”

There are two ways to make an AI. One is to use an individual human’s brain as a blueprint. This is illegal. The other is to make such an AI splinter, whatever that means and however one does it. This is  _ super _ illegal. 

Project Freelancer is experimenting with making AIs in a way that’s completely new and unprecedented, and therefore, totally legal. York isn’t clear on the details of it. The Director doesn’t talk much and is always busy, the Counselor says that he’s only got a psychology degree, the rest of the Freelancers only know as much as he does, and the few scientists he’s asked have only nervously muttered a bunch of scientific jargon that made absolutely zero sense to him before slinking away. So, he guesses that this is all just so far above him that he can’t hope to understand it without, like, a decade in college learning about brains and circuits and shit. No thanks. 

It’s important to learn how to make AIs in a legal way so that they can publically mass produce them and then, of course, weaponize them. It’s the Great War.  _ Everything’s  _ being weaponized. Everyone. Every single project and experiment and invention is all about, if not how to most effectively kill a bunch of people, about how to more effectively win the war. 

York likes to be useful. This is what his skill sets for. He’s helping something important happen. 

He tries not to think about what’ll happen to all of those mass produced AIs once the war’s over. The war being over is a distant dream at this point; they can cross that bridge as a species when they come to it. 

Plus, York can’t keep millions of people safe. He can keep a dozen people safe at most. Millions sounds more like a team effort. For now, he’s fine with trying to radiate concern and ‘I am definitely an available and non judging shoulder to cry on at any moment just so you know’ in Carolina’s direction (because if he actually  _ verbalized _ any of that she might actually punch him, or airlock him, or throw him off an observation platform), watching his teammates’ backs in the field, and trying to talk Simmons out of his crazy. 

_ <I’m not crazy!> _ Simmons protests crazily.  _ <My theory makes completely sound sense!> _

“Uh huh,” York says. 

_ <I mean it! Think about it! All of the names are the same, all of the faces are new, the strange hallucinations and dreams are consistent and definitely aren’t from _ your  _ subconscious-- they’re memories! We used to be humans!> _

His words, technically, make sense. It’s just that his frantic ‘lizardmen _ are _ real and I finally have the proof!’ tone of voice--not to mention the overly excited and impulsive feelings he’s rapidly pulsing with-- makes York want to give him a mug of hot chocolate and comfortingly shush him until he calms down. 

_ <And then we died horribly and we reincarnated as AI!> _

And that. That part of the ‘theory’ makes the whole thing feel a bit more suspect and shaky in general. 

“Simmons, I feel like if you just kinda calmed down for a bit, just like really _ slept _ on this--” 

_ <I don’t sleep, York.> _

“You’re in my dreams with me, Simmons.” 

_ <That’s  _ you _ sleeping and taking me along for the ride. > _

“Oh so you’re perfectly aware and lucid and logical during?” 

_ <That’s besides the point!> _

“Is it? ANYWAYS. If you just take some deep breaths-- _ I know you don’t have lungs, _ Simmons, just bear with me, if you just  _ metaphorically  _ take some deep breaths and sleep on it then you might have some seconds thoughts about at least some parts of your theory.” 

_ <What are you implying!?> _ Simmons demands insecurely. 

“You  _ know _ what I’m implying,” he says. 

_ <That I’m CRAZY!?> _

“No!”

_ <Well then I  _ don’t _ know! > _

“I’m just saying that I think you’re a bit caught up in the heat of the moment and--” 

_ <\--being crazy about it!?> _

“Don’t put words in my mouth!” 

_ <Don’t put crazy in my circuits!> _

“You’re not making any sense!” 

_ <Your  _ face _ doesn’t-- > _

“Trouble in paradise?” Donut asks with great curiosity. York twitches and looks behind him to see Donut trying to radiate ‘I am a good listener and an excellent secret keeper’ and South with her arms crossed, helmet cocked in a way that makes him feel pretty certain that he’s being glared at. 

_ <He’s neither of those things,> _ Simmons discloses. 

York does a private sarcastic little eye roll, hopefully successfully communicating his reaction of  _ oh wow really?  _

“We’re fine,” he says. “Simmons is just a bit…” He tries to think of a tactful word.  _ “Wrong.”  _

Simmons mentally hurls the concept of  _ offense _ at York. York grins. 

“York,” South says, oozing threat from every inch of her posture. “You better watch yourself.” 

“Um, wh-- oh my god.” 

_ <It’s the shovel talk,> _ Simmons breathes, suddenly distracted. 

“I will rip your--” 

“South, it’s not like that!” 

“What do you mean  _ it’s not like that?  _ Is he just a, a _ game  _ to you or something?” Indignance is rapidly building in South’s voice. Donut gasps, a hand to his helmet covered mouth, scandalized. 

“No!” he yelps, hands up. 

“So you’re going to treat him right!?” 

“Yes! I mean, we’re not--” 

“Because if you don’t then you’ll be _ lucky _ if I get to you first. You don’t want to know what that bastard did to my first ex.” 

“But--” 

“But fucking nothing!” 

York distantly notes that Simmons is out now, maroon light in the corner of his eye, and that he and Donut’s heads are swinging back and forth like they’re avidly following an intense tennis match. 

“This isn’t--” he tries hopelessly. The PA rings out, cutting him off. 

_ “Would Agent York please report to the Director’s office ASAP?” _ FILS’s voice rings out throughout the entire ship.  _ “I repeat, Agent York report to the Director’s office ASAP.”  _

“Oooh,” Donut, South, and two passing mechanics all say in mean unison, old highschool instincts apparently rising up within them to temporarily possess their bodies as York is summoned to the principal’s office because someone tattled that he was smoking behind the gym last period. 

York misses when it actually felt like he was an adult in war and not a teenager going through a crushingly mundane hell. He’s got an  _ AI _ in his head, for god’s sake. 

York goes to the Director’s office, Simmons jittering with nerves in his head the entire way as he tries to guess what they’ve done wrong. 

“He could just be calling us in to assign us a mission,” he says. 

_ <Just us? From him? Announced over the PA? Now? Why?> _

He has, unfortunately, a point. Simmons notices him acknowledging this and briefly spikes with vindication, before descending into even deeper nervousness. 

He thinks, idly, about the dream. Caught up by Simmons’ infectious irrational conviction and then distracted by one embarrassment after another, he hasn’t really had the time until now. But… it is strange. It’s all strange. The dreams in which he doesn’t feel like himself, the disorienting lost time in which his thoughts don’t feel like his own. But of course sharing minds with someone is bound to make things screwy; weird thoughts and and weird dreams and weird subconscious urges. It’s just a strange without a ready explanation, instead only leaving behind confusion and curiosity. Sometimes, he swears to god, he loses himself and feels like he’s  _ Simmons  _ for a moment, but that doesn’t come with feeling like a chip with very complicated code running on it. He feels like a person, a human, someone normal with a body and a life that isn’t exactly like York’s, but similar enough not to feel alien at all. 

One way to make an AI is to use a human’s brain as a blueprint. A copy, an electronic twin. This is illegal, even in wartime. They can’t use it to try and win the war, even as they’re struggling and desperate and scrabbling for any solution at all. 

An idea is niggling away at York’s brain, and then he enters the Director’s office, and he focuses on standing very straight and looking utterly professional instead. He feels Simmons grab at the idea that York wouldn’t even be able to verbalize yet for how raw and unformed it is, grabbing at distractions. The Director makes Simmons nervous with how much he wants to impress him,  _ nervous _ being the understatement of the year. It tends to make York tongue tied by osmosis, so they’re trying something new where Simmons doesn’t obsess about the Director in his presence while York is supposed to be presenting himself as a competent and calm adult. 

“Agent York,” the Director says cooly, back turned to him and reading through a datapad. 

“Director,” he says. “What did you call me for?” 

“I only hire the best of the best,” the Director says. “From how unexceptional your file is, it would have never occurred to me to hire you without Agent Carolina’s recommendation.” 

That’s fair. York erred on the side of caution while creating his papers and made himself seem as mundane and uninteresting as possible, nothing to make him stick in people’s memories or anything that could be double checked. 

Maybe that’s why he’s been called here. Maybe they’ve finally looked closely enough to see that things don’t quite line up. He deliberately doesn’t fidget. 

“And it seems that she was right. You’ve been a competent field agent, Agent York.” 

_ <Oh my god,> _ Simmons says, and York tries to mentally shoo him back to whatever he’s trying to occupy himself with. 

“But,” the Director says, like ice, and here it comes, the dressing down for whatever he’s done now, “it is vital to behave in a professional manner.” 

“If this is about breaking the vending machine in the rec room--” 

“You will not distract the other Freelancers. You will not harm their performance.” 

“Um. Yes, sir?” 

The Director turns around, looks at him. It feels a bit like being sized up by a giant eagle, even though York feels like he could easily enough shove him into his wardrobe locker. “Fraternization with colleagues isn’t allowed, Agent York.” 

_ Oh shit he’s found about Carolina.  _

“As the Freelancer with the higher ranking, I’m holding you responsible for ending this foolishness.” 

Wait. Higher ranking. He doesn’t seriously mean--

“If I find out that you’ve continued this arrangement with Agent North Dakota despite my reprimands then you will…  _ regret _ it.” 

York stares as a man who is his boss with the body of a nerd and the voice of a drunk cowboy threatens him to make him stop fucking someone he isn’t fucking, although he is definitely fucking _ someone.  _

At length, he clears his throat. “Yes… sir. I promise… that I will not… have…  _ relations…  _ with Agent North.” 

It _ is _ the truth. 

“Good. Now get out of my office.” 

York hurriedly gets out of his office, sprints down two hallways, looks around for any obvious cameras, and then falls to his knees and starts laughing. 

_ <That was really stupid,> _ Simmons says.  _ <And embarrassing and terrible.> _

York nods and laughs some more. 

_ <But also, York, you were right. That theory  _ was  _ wrong.> _

“G--glad to hear that your reasoning has come back from vacation, Simmons.” 

_ <Because I’ve come up with a new and better theory now!> _

Oh, fantastic. He can’t wait to hear this one. 


	44. catch her

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Simmons’ new theory actually makes sense. York immediately knows who he wants to tell.

Simmons’ new theory actually makes sense. York immediately knows who he wants to tell.

“Carolina,” he says, “I need to talk to you about something--”

“Sorry, but I’ve got a mission,” she says without even turning her helmet in his direction, and she slips into 479er’s waiting craft.

 

“Carolina, I want to talk--”

“Busy,” she says, and vaults over an observation balcony and drops twelve feet down onto the training floor.

 

“Carolina, I--”

“Gotta go,” she says, and darts into the airlock she was just passing. He hears the hiss of air and clunk of heavy machinery as it opens up onto the outside of the ship.

 _ <She just escaped into the vacuum of space to get away from you,> _ Simmons says, sounding impressed.

“Shut up,” he mutters. “Maybe she had something to do there.”

_ <In the vacuum of space?> _

“Shut _up.”_

 

He knows that feelings are a forbidden topic, with Carolina. He knows that she needs her space sometimes. He knows that she’s a workaholic. It’s not like he thought that she’d be unaffected by what happened to Maine. This will pass, in time. She’ll slow down long enough to let him catch her, sooner or later. He wishes that she’d let him help her, but she just needs time. Hopefully.

For now, he needs someone else to talk to, because it’s kind of _killing_ him that only he and Simmons knows about this. Just one other person, just one partner in crime, and he can relax.

If not Carolina, then who else is there? Florida? Pfft, no. South? Terrible idea. Wash? Nah. Wyoming, CT, no, he isn’t really that close to them. Who else, who else…

Oh. Of course.

_ <Obviously, York.> _


	45. the Simmons Theory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Shut up, the theory has been improved,” Simmons snaps. “That was merely my nascent hypothesis! Just some brainstorming, initial concepts.”
> 
> “Oh yeah, you absolutely weren’t invested earlier, we could tell,” Grif says.

Grif definitely isn’t  _ worried _ about Caboose, it’s just. Weird. That he’s not here. Because if he’s not here then that means that he’s probably not in anyone, for weeks now, just like, what, tossed into a drawer somewhere? Like a shitty ballpoint pen mostly out of ink left to be forgotten? 

“Well, his host died,” North points out. “No one for him to be plugged into.” 

_ <He can be plugged into literally anyone if they just do a quick surgery first. And guess what this ship’s full of: people!> _

“I doubt the Director would sanction an AI being implanted in the janitor, Grif.” 

< _ It doesn’t have to be the janitor. There are  _ other Freelancers _. Isn’t the whole point of AIs to have them in Freelancers? > _

North squeezes the trigger. The target, a small red holopad over a dozen feet away and moving erratically while being controlled by FILS, freezes in place and goes green. Another hit. North swivels around, searching for the next target on his scope. 

“I think the Director’s got kind of a strict cut off for who gets one. The only people so far who’s gotten one is on the leaderboard, after all.” 

_ <Oh, that’s too bad. If only there was someone on the leaderboard with an available head-- oh wait! There is someone like that! Multiple someones! And hey, the person _ on top  _ of the leaderboard even already has a neck port and already has hosted Caboose and only stopped because Maine needed a shitty translator! What an awesome and incredible coincidence.> _

“Well… that’s true, I guess--” 

_ “Agent North,” _ FILS says from the speakers in the room.  _ “If you are concerned over AI Caboose’s missing presence, do not worry. He was merely damaged some during Agent Maine’s defection, and is currently in reparation.”  _

_ <Eavesdropper,> _ Grif mutters. He feels North’s mind snag a bit at the world ‘defection’, but he shrugs it off when one of the target zigzags into his field of vision. Grif himself is a bit preoccupied by the word  _ damaged, _ and what exactly that might mean. 

Not that he’s worried. Not that he really in particular cares. He just wants to know, is all, if Caboose is fine or not. Or if he’s going to be fine again. Can be fine again. 

He’d seemed to like Maine a lot, even though he was a mostly silent weirdo. 

“Shouldn’t you be helping me with this?” North murmurs, more quietly after FILS’ interruption. 

_ <What, you want for me to shield you from the targets?> _

“Orrr, you could use your special AI processing powers to just help me pick them out.” 

_ <Eh, you seem like you’re going a fine enough job on your own. Plus, I wouldn’t want to become a crutch for you, North.> _

“Oh, of course, thank you so much for thinking of me, Grif.” 

Grif deliberately doesn’t pick up on the sarcasm.  _ <Happy to be of help.> _

North sees a glint of red out of the corner of his eye and whips around with his sniper rifle--

_ <THAT’S MAROON DON’T SHOOT IT’S NOT RED YOU IDIOT,> _ Grif hollers inside his head, loud like a cymbal crash inside of a broom closet. North flinches hard enough to squeeze the trigger anyways, and Grif throws up his shield around them without thinking to stop the bullet--

Purple paint splats onto yellow hexagons. No live ammo during training. Right. 

Grif takes down the shield, feeling like a burning hot coal of sheepish defensive embarrassment. Damn it, he’d really freaked out there. North shakes his head and lowers his gun, feelings of consolation and  _ hey it’s not a big deal _ coming from him. Also some amused fond  _ aww he cares _ which is  _ uncalled for,  _ but he’s too busy turtling into his own mortification and trying to pretend like nothing happened. 

York and a small glowing Simmons, standing in the doorway to the training room, both have their hands up like they’re bank robbers surrendering to the police at gunpoint. 

“Don’t shoot!” York shouts, clearly smiling underneath his helmet. “We’re giving up without a fight! Simmons, surrender protocol!” 

Simmons’ hologram is now holding a tiny white glowing flag that he’s waving in the air. “It’d be against the Geneva Conventions for you to kill us now, just so you know! I assume you can’t read, Grif, but it’s right there in the rules!” 

_ <Nevermind,> _ Grif says. _ <Gun them down, North. No mercy.> _

North shoots York in the face with no hesitation. Grif and Simmons squawk in shock in tandem as York falls backwards onto his ass. 

“Ack!” York yelps.  _ “North!  _ I can’t see shit!” 

“Oops,” North says mildly, smiling, and walks over to offer York a hand up and a towel for his visor that’s now painted purple. 

_ <Good to know that you’d kill a man if I just tell you to.> _

“You’re evil,” York accuses, rubbing at his visor. Simmons isn’t saying anything, but he has his hands on his hips in that particular ‘judgemental mom’ way he has. 

“Such a cruel thing to say to a teammate,” North says, a hand to his chest as if he’s genuinely wounded. 

“Says the guy who just _ shot me in the face.”  _

“Really, it was more like the equivalent of being hit by a water balloon.” 

“Fired at bullet speed. And the water is paint. To the _ face.”  _

“An accident, I swear!” 

“I’m gonna make the Director mark you down for friendly fire.” 

The threat doesn’t have any real heat to it. North doesn’t believe it for a second, Grif can feel. “Oh dear.” 

“Uh…  _ speaking  _ of the Director,” York says, suddenly looking hesitant and shifty, and then Simmons winks out of sight. “Simmons-- no, I gotta-- I should tell him-- Simmons! That’s fighting dirty, come on.  _ Simmons.”  _

North and Grif watch York argue himself for a few more moments before York’s shoulders clearly slump with defeat. “Ugh, fine, fine,” he groans, “I’ll drop it.” 

“Drop what?” Grif asks, popping up. 

“Nothing!” Simmons protests sharply, appearing a split second later. 

“Oh wow, nothing huh,” he drawls. “Nothing that’s about the Director.” 

“Exactly.” Simmons nods. “The Director didn’t say something weird to us at all.” 

“I heard on the PA a few days ago that the Director wanted to talk to you in his office, by the way,” North comments in a friendly small talk fashion, like casually making a comment about the weather or the game last weekend. 

“Uhhhh yeah,” York says. “That’s when he said. Nothing weird to us. That’s when it happened.” 

“Good to know!” 

“So did you come here to tell us that the Director hasn’t said anything weird to you lately for no specific reason, or was there something else?” Grif asks dryly. 

“My theory!” Simmons says. 

Grif rolls his entire head. 

“You already told us about your theory,” North says with polite diplomacy. 

“I still haven’t gotten the chance to make fun of you for it, by the way,” Grif says. He’s been puzzling at the back of his head all day how to make fun of York’s ‘and they were LOVERS’ punchline without accidentally making fun of himself as well. He kind of really wanted to ask if those were  _ York’s _ words or  _ Simmons’, _ but specifically in a way that indicated that it didn’t really matter to him whatever the answer was. 

“Shut up, the theory has been  _ improved,” _ Simmons snaps. “That was merely my nascent hypothesis! Just some brainstorming, initial concepts.” 

“Oh yeah, you absolutely weren’t invested earlier, we could tell,” Grif says. 

Simmons makes a noise that reminds him of a teakettle that’s kind of hilarious and kind of adorable when York decides to intervene. 

“The _ new theory,”  _ he says, “is this: our AIs are imprints of soldier volunteers.” 

“That’s not exactly legal,” North points out. “Isn’t the whole point of this project to find a way to legally create AIs so that we can use them in the war effort?” 

“Lots of things this project does isn’t ‘exactly legal’. So what if the  _ actual _ goal is to see if the Project can believably lie about where their AIs are coming from? They create them the usual reliable way, but then claim to have made them with some new, legal, patented, not publically available method and see if they can get away with it?” 

“That’s…” North trails off. He was probably going to say _ unethical  _ or _ immoral. _ Or maybe  _ practical.  _ North can surprise, sometimes. 

“The powers that be may not even look into it too closely, considering how desperate humanity is at this point,” Simmons says. “The Director may be betting on that.” 

“... Okay,” Grif says. “This one’s slightly more convincing.” 

“HA!” Simmons crows. “Yes! I told you so!” 

“Oh,  _ shut up.”  _

“My theory was right!” 

“You haven’t even proven anything yet, smartass, you’re just speculating.” 

“I’m right and you know it! Why else would we have buried memories of being human soldiers, hm!? We’re imprints!” 

Doesn’t mean that he has to be so  _ smug _ about it. “You know what, I think that you were right earlier, actually.” 

“What?” 

“Reincarnation, Simmons. We are merely going through the cycle of life.” 

“No, that was just-- a flight of fancy, okay, that’s not what I’m sticking with.” 

“Flight of fancy, who talks like that, what are you, a Victorian gentlewoman?  And  _ I’m _ sticking with it. It sounds way more plausible! I’m so sorry for doubting you, Simmons, you were right. About the reincarnation thing. Not the corrupt lying thing, that sounds so stupid and silly. The military complex, _ lying  _ to the  _ public?  _ That’s  _ ridiculous.” _

“Fuck you, I know what you’re doing, Grif!” 

“Doing what? It’s a smart theory! In fact, I think I’m just going to go ahead and name it the Simmons Theory, to honor it’s creator, of course. I don’t steal credit.”

“York, punch North!” 

“What, no!” 

“He shot you! He deserves it!” 

“That’s--! A… good point.” 

“Fate and destiny brought us here,” Grif marvels. “Absolutely amazing.” 

“SCIENCE BROUGHT US HERE,” Simmons howls. “YORK, DO VIOLENCE _ NOW.”  _

York looks at North. North smiles and shrugs. “I could use a sparring partner.” 

 

There is a human Grif and Simmons out there somewhere, oblivious about what their volunteering created. Crawling around in trenches and shouting and shooting and worrying about much simpler dangers than Project Freelancer. 

Grif wonders how close they are. If some of Simmons’ first theory was true after all. 

Not that it concerns him. He doesn’t really have anything to do with that person, the person who is the more real him. He can’t reach him, can’t talk to him, can’t affect him. Can’t even fully remember that other Grif, the first Grif’s, life. He’s based on his personality, not his memory. The person he is made of is unreachable, and what would even be the point of reaching him if he could? Better to just leave him alone completely. Better to just forget about him. Better to just stop thinking about him totally and live as Grif, the one and only. Why worry about things that you can’t change? That only leads to pointless misery. 

“You’re thinking some heavy thoughts,” North says. 

_ <Nothing that matters,> _ he replies, and manages to distract North into dropping the subject. 


	46. incompetence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In a messy scrawl: Dexter Grif

The next day, North is accidentally included in an email chain that seems to be exclusively intended for high position paper pushers working in PFL. He realizes this a bit too late to have never opened and read it. Human error, or as Grif would put it, a massive fuck up that some dipshit is probably going to get fired over. Not that it’s really the  _ biggest _ fuck up ever. It could have gone to someone who shouldn’t know about the project at all, although he’s not sure if the coding would even allow for that to be a possible mistake. It’s not as if they’re using Gmail, after all. 

Anyways, even if it’s not intended for North’s eyes, it’s not… hmm, wait. Screenshots, documents… sign here… by signing this I acknowledge the risks… consent forms… non disclosure agreements… 

In looping cursive: Franklin Delano Donut

In neat straight letters: Richard Simmons

In a slanted script: Lavernius Tucker

In a wavering handwriting with some of the letters backwards: Mikayle Jay Cabooose

In bold capital letters: SARGE

In a messy scrawl: Dexter Grif

_ <Well shit,> _ Grif says.  _ <We’re taking this to our graves.> _

“And why’s that?” North asks, deleting the email, closing the browser, and hopelessly hoping that no one’s going to notice that he saw that. It wasn’t his fault. He can’t get in trouble for that, can he? 

_ <Because Simmons is  _ unbearable _ when he gets to do an _ I told you so. >

“Oh, you should see South. She’s got the memory of an elephant when it comes to times when she was right and I was wrong.” Also for grudges. Really whenever it‘s convenient for her. He deletes his browser history for good measure. He feels like he’s washing all of the blood away from his crime scene without bothering to move the body. 

Honestly, he vaguely feels like he just stumbled upon a manilla envelope with the words TOP SECRET stamped in red on it lying on the floor in the public hallway. Except, of course, that no one uses paper any longer, except for spies. 

He supposes that even top secret military organizations aren’t immune to bureaucratic incompetence, though. 

(North never does get in trouble for opening that email.)


	47. the start to a porno

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tucker grumbles as Wash continues to chew.
> 
> North, who’s been more picking at his food than eating it for the last five minutes, speaks up.
> 
> “Does…” he trails off. Spears a single slice of carrot on his fork and chews and eats it. Tucker knows that they’ve got no resistance to them; chewing really isn’t necessary to be honest. He swallows. “Does Project Freelancer ever seem a bit… weird, to you?”

Monday. A slab of beef covered in watery brown gravy. A side of boiled broccoli, carrots, and potatoes. Yesterday, they had cod covered in watery white sauce, with a side of boiled broccoli, carrots, and potatoes. Tomorrow, a shockingly mediocre Taco Tuesday, presumably for ‘morale’. As predictable as clockwork. 

_ <Would some variety kill them?> _ Tucker asks as Wash dutifully eats his meal with no pleasure but no great disgust either. Like brushing his teeth or putting on his armor, mechanical and thoughtless. Tucker has a vague idea that eating isn’t supposed to be like this. Not  _ all  _ of the time, at least. Not _ every single day.  _

“It’s the military,” Wash says around a mouthful of potatoes, “so yes.” 

Tucker grumbles as Wash continues to chew. 

North, who’s been more picking at his food than eating it for the last five minutes, speaks up. 

“Does…” he trails off. Spears a single slice of carrot on his fork and chews and eats it. Tucker knows that they’ve got no resistance to them; chewing really isn’t necessary to be honest. He swallows. “Does Project Freelancer ever seem a bit…  _ weird,  _ to you?” 

Wash cocks his head to the side and frowns, puzzled, thoughtful. “Not really? What do you mean?” 

_ <It is SO weird, Wash!> _ Tucker protests.  _ <We don’t even get Netflix here! I’m pretty sure that’s a basic human right. Like water and stuff.> _

Wash doesn’t even dignify that with a response, which is just hypocritical. Tucker caught some of his wistful longing for a good dramatic trashy serial the other day! Which Tucker is  _ all _ about, some of those sex scenes are real good. 

North eats another vegetable, obviously just as a stalling tactic. No one actively  _ wants _ to eat this stuff. “Like…” He frowns, looks suspiciously around the cafeteria. “Never mind.” His frown drops away for one of his usual gentle, carefree smiles. “It’s nothing,” he assures them, and efficiently eats the rest of his meal without saying anything at all. 

“O… kay.” Wash’s attention kinda poke in Tucker’s direction questioningly, with like an unsettled sort of vibe to them. 

_ <Yeah, no, he’s definitely being weird,> _ Tucker agrees.  _ <It’s not just you.> _

Validated, Wash shakes it off with a casual shrug and goes back to his bland meal, forgetting all about it. 

 

“Weird like they’re listening in on us,” North says the next day apropos of nothing. 

“Whug!?” Wash squeaks, jumping and almost slipping on the wet tile to horrible consequences. 

“I thought it’d be pretty dumb to talk about how I’m worried about the common areas in the ship being bugged while in a common area in the ship,” he says, turning his head slightly towards them with a good humored smile. “So I thought that the showers would be safer. So long as we don’t talk too loud and the sprays are on.” 

“Um?” Wash says, looking at him wide eyed. “I, uh, wow you’re sneaky.” 

North is standing underneath the spray to their left, no wall or divider between them. 

“I think your situational awareness is just your weak spot,” North says, not unkindly. He uncaps a bottle of the same general use personal soap that all of the Freelancer’s are supplied with, squirting some of it into his palm. 

_ <Is this the start to a porno?> _ Tucker asks with hushed awe.  _ <Is he gonna tell you to bend over and use that as lube? Are you going to call him senpai?> _

“Shut up,” Wash hisses underneath his breath at him. Tucker can feel him flushing, but according to the chemicals in his brain it unfortunately seems to be more from a combination of the hot water and embarrassment than arousal. Siiiigh. North’s abs are  _ chiseled. _ Wash is giving up a perfectly good opportunity. Oppornturnity. Bow chicka bow wow. 

Disappointingly, instead of giving Wash a smoldering look, North starts working the soap into his hair instead. Well, missed opportunity for him! Wash’s abs are chiseled too, so there. Not that Wash would’ve taken him up on it, the buzzkill. 

“You, uh, think the Project is listening in on us?” Wash asks, trying not to seem too awkward as he hushedly discusses spy adjacent things while wet and naked with his wet and naked friend in the showers. It mostly involves fixedly staring at the wall in front of him. 

“Yes,” North says. “I know that there are security cameras everywhere, and all of the comm channels are monitored, but that’s not too unusual for a military operation, especially one that’s supposed to be hush hush. I just think it’s strange when the project starts spying on its own soldiers during their leisure time, when they’re in unimportant areas of the ship doing unimportant things. Feels strange.” 

“How did you find out about that?” he asks. Tucker can feel his growing discomfort, not just at how the conversation is being held, but the contents themselves. Doesn’t like the idea of assuming that he’s being spied on when he isn’t, likes the idea of assuming that he isn’t when is even less. Hates the idea of PFL being behind it. He owes them, and more to the point, they’re what he got instead of a court martial. A last chance that he’s gotten thoroughly entangled with. No easy break if it turns out that working conditions aren’t... pleasant. He’d just have to ride it out for who knows how long. Until the project ends? When is that? When the  _ war _ ends? 

There are people claiming that that won’t happen anytime soon in his current lifetime. Lots of people. 

The best case scenario, clearly, is that North is just wrong. It’s too bad that he seems like one of their more competent and level headed coworkers. 

“It’s a hunch more than anything, really. Just some weird coincidences piling up--” 

While Wash is being nervous about his  _ job  _ and  _ politics,  _ Tucker’s started thinking about something far more important. 

_ <Wait ONE MOMENT,> _ he interrupts, and Wash startles enough for North to notice and stop talking, paying attention to them. _ <If he’s saying that the project-- the ship-- our bosses-- oh god the  _ director,> he breathes, horrified. 

“Your AI started shouting?” North asks sympathetically. 

“What about the Director?” Wash asks as he nods at North. 

_ <Has he heard us jacking off, Wash?> _ he demands, and Wash chokes a bit on his own spit.  _ <Answer me! Be real with me! Tell it to me straight, doc! Has that pencil necked weirdo heard us strangling the hot dog late at night!?> _

“Don’t--call it that--” 

“Are you okay?” North asks, brow gently furrowed with concern as he places one bare hand on Wash’s bare shoulder. Tucker perks up with interest before he remembers to be horrified. 

_ <Oh my god. Is he watching us  _ right now? _ That not hot perv? Wash, cover our bits! > _

“They’re _ my--”  _

_ <And you want him ogling them!? Oh fuck, we’re gonna have to start spanking it while on missions out in enemy territory--> _

“Absolutely not--” 

_ <\--in the dirty trenches while the enemy shoots at us--> _

“No! How is that at all acceptable to you? What--” 

_ <Wash, our DICK!> _

Wash twists the spray off and snatches up his towel and wraps it swiftly around his hips, bright red. 

“I’ve got to go,” he says weakly, leaving without making eye contact. 

“... Well, he didn’t take that well at all,” North says to the empty shower room. A moment later, he chuckles at something no one but him could possibly hear. “Guess we’ll just have to stick with one conspiring partner.” 


	48. York

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> York’s reasons for forging his paperwork, for having a fake name and a fake past and joining the military for fake reasons, are honestly not that dramatic or tragic. At least, he doesn’t think so. They weren’t happy circumstances, but he’s always thought of them as mundane. Not unusual. Thousands, millions of people have gone through what he has. He really should’ve seen it coming. He shouldn’t have been so shocked.
> 
> It’s just that, stupidly, he’d hoped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly this one is skippable if anyone finds the content triggering.

York’s reasons for forging his paperwork, for having a fake name and a fake past and joining the military for fake reasons, are honestly not that dramatic or tragic. At least, he doesn’t think so. They weren’t happy circumstances, but he’s always thought of them as mundane. Not unusual. Thousands, millions of people have gone through what he has. He really should’ve seen it coming. He shouldn’t have been so shocked. 

It’s just that, stupidly, he’d  _ hoped.  _

 

One day, he’s just overwhelmed by how sick of it all he is. From his family, his friends, his classmates, teachers,  _ strangers.  _ Calling him things that are wrong, ‘she’ and ‘her’ and ‘miss’ and ‘young lady’ and on and on and  _ on. _ It  _ grates.  _ He wishes it would stop, just a little bit, from any direction. But he knows that if he tells one of them, all of them will know. Small community, people talk. Especially his father, gregarious and friendly and popular and outgoing. If he tells anyone, it’ll get back to him sooner or later. He doesn’t want to tell his dad. He knows how risky it is, letting your  _ parent _ know while you still live with them. 

But his dad is the most grating one of all, with all of his fond ribbing about what a tomboy he is, going ‘Angela it’s dinner’ and ‘Angela do you want to watch a movie’ and ‘Angela do you want a ride to school’. He’s managed to get everyone at school to start referring to him by a nickname that doesn’t rub him wrong the way ‘she’ does, but his dad good naturedly refuses. 

If he can just get his dad to go along with this, then it doesn’t  _ really _ matter what everyone else thinks. He’ll live. He’ll be happier. 

He works up the courage, and he tells him during commercial break. 

His dad smiles him at him silently for a while, like he’s waiting for the punchline. He just silently stares back at him, serious, fingers knotted in the hem of his shirt. The smile slowly drops from his dad’s face, and it looks strange in its absence. It happens so rarely. He looks a bit like a stranger, suddenly, in his dad’s clothes, sitting on his dad’s spot on the couch. 

“You’re kidding,” his dad says. 

“No,” he says. “I’m not.” 

His dad looks at him for a moment longer, before laughing and turning back to his show. 

He should have taken the brush off and dropped it there, retreated and sucked it up and let his dad ignore it. 

Instead, he feels anger and bile surge up in his throat, and he stands up and he  _ screams,  _ he shouts until his dad can’t keep ignoring him, has to _ listen _ to him, hear what he’s saying, really  _ look _ at him. Eventually, his dad stands up and starts shouting too, which is something foreign and strange and scary so he shouts back  _ louder _ and then suddenly, abruptly, his dad’s grabbed him by the neck of his shirt, hauled him painfully through the living room, kitchen, and hallway, and thrown him out of the house and onto the gravel drive up outside. He scrambles up, gravel rash stinging, opening his mouth to furiously shout some more through the tears--

_ “Come back when you’re ready to be my little girl again!”  _ his dad bellows, and slams the door shut before he can get so much as a word out. 

 

Honestly, he shouldn’t be so surprised, so shocked, so  _ wounded. _ Who didn’t see that coming? As if he hadn’t subtly probed him before on how he felt about trans people? Tried to convince him without seeming like he had a particular stake in the argument? What had he been thinking? That it’d be different if it was his own kid? Someone he loved? 

How naive. 

 

He sulks around town for a day and a night, before he comes back in the morning hungry and cold even though it’s late spring and tired and thirsty and needing to go the bathroom because he hadn’t wanted to pee in the bushes or some alley without toilet paper and he’s wearing the same clothes as yesterday and he hasn’t showered or brushed his teeth and he feels _ gross _ and he’s still upset in a numb, resigned sort of way and he just wants to collapse into his bed and be left alone. 

He tries to open the front door. His dad, who’s boasted several times about how the neighborhood is so safe that he just leaves the door unlocked, has apparently locked the door. He looks underneath the welcome matt. The spare key is gone. He sighs, long and exhausted, his dehydration migraine pounding, and knocks on the door like he's a visitor. 

After a moment, he hears his dad’s familiar heavy footsteps down those familiar creaking stairs, and then the door opens. He looks up at his dad, who looks stern and sad in a way he never does. 

“Well?” his dad asks. 

“Well what,” he says, his voice a croak. 

His dad gives him a chiding look. “Aren’t you going to apologize, Angela?” 

He _ explodes. _ His dad slams the door back in his face. 

 

He pisses in a bush, drinks from a park fountain, eats a half eaten slice of pizza he finds in a garbage can, and sleeps underneath the warm vents at the back of a bakery. He wakes up, and he’s still wounded and  _ fucking pissed.  _

He walks home. His dad’s car isn’t there. He’s at work. He should be at school. Fucking fuck that. 

He tries to open the front door, the back door, every window he can reach, and looks underneath every nearby decorative rock and brick and possible hiding place for the spare key. He can’t find it. He stares blankly at the patio door, all wire net mesh to keep the bugs out and wood and glass. Too bad he doesn’t know how to pick locks. 

His dad is really doing this. He’s seriously not going to take him back unless he caves, which he fucking won’t. It took every drop of bravery he had to say all of that. He’s never taking that back. He’s never going to backpedal. He needs to stand by it, or else he’ll never regain the courage to do it a second time, and he won’t fucking live with the  _ grating.  _

He’d thought that his dad was nice. That he loved him. That he was a good dad. Everyone thought that. It was his whole personality, his _thing._ Good old friendly Jeff, everyone loves him. 

His eyes sting. He grits his teeth. 

He kicks the fucking door down. It’s a flimsy thing, and it breaks easily in big splinters and shards of glass, net tearing. He walks inside, and he robs his dad blind without guilt or regret. This bridge has already been burned, so he might as well take everything he can with him. 

 

Things get easier for a few weeks after that. He’s got a toothbrush and toothpaste and deodorant and changes of clothes and a TV and lots of other things to pawn for money. He sleeps in cheap motel rooms and showers in cheap motel showers and eats cheap diner and gas station meals, using public bathrooms and taking the bus and the train and  _ not _ hitchhiking because he’s heard stories, okay. 

He kinda misses his old life, except how it’s not worth the whole ‘Angela’ part of it. And it’s all tainted now, anyways. His dad wasn’t the man he thought he was. He doesn’t care. He  _ doesn’t.  _

The money runs out. The things to pawn runs out. He’s left in a bustling city with no idea what to do. 

In the end, he settles for drinking water from park fountains and eating food wherever he can get it and sleeping in any warm place he can find and finding outhouses rented out for construction sites or events to go in and begging all day for a few coins and he settles into a dull grinding routine. Life becomes kinda hazy, kinda blurry. And then the toothpaste runs out. 

He stares at the empty tube. He squeezes it. Squeezes it harder. Tries to get even a tiny bit more to come out. 

Nothing. He’s out of toothpaste.  _ He’s out of--  _

 

He has a weird crying fit about running out of toothpaste, and then he decides to rob someone. There are no convenient targets around, no one who has rejected and wronged him and clearly deserves it. He decides to just steal from someone whose place looks pretty nice and not take too much. He _ needs _ it. 

He smashes in the glass door at the back of someone’s house with a rock. An alarm starts wailing. He flinches and runs away without taking anything. 

 

He tries again. He’s got a knife that someone gave him for being their lookout while they sold ecstasy or whatever, which is shitty payment but whatever, and he roughly hammers it into a lock with a rock. People _ really _ like decorative rocks. 

Shockingly, it works. He takes a shower, steals the toothpaste, has a big meal, and grabs an iPad to hock. 

 

The next time, it occurs to him to look under someone’s welcome matt. It seriously, actually fucking works. 

 

He gets a phone with a cracked screen that works anyways, and he immediately looks up lockpicking tutorials. 

 

He gets caught. He got greedy, he got stupid, he got unlucky, there were cameras and now half his face is swelling up and the cop in the corner of the room is giving him the stink eye. He gives them the stink eye right back. 

A woman enters the room, and she gives the cop a condescending smile and shoos him off with a flick of her fingers. She draws up a seat in front of him. She wearing a suit and a smile that he can only be described as ‘sleazy’. 

“You’ve gotten yourself into a lot of trouble, young lady,” she notes mildly. 

“Don’t call me that,” he says, too beaten and bruised to hiss and spit like he wants to. He didn’t spend his last winter in a homeless shelter just to  _ still  _ be called ‘young lady’. 

“My apologies,” she says smoothly. “I’d call you by your name, but according to my associates you don’t seem to have one?” 

He doesn’t say anything. He’s not going face his dad now. The bastard’s lost his chance, not that he’s likely to have changed his mind. 

_ “Mysterious,” _ she says, grinning, teasing. If he wasn’t in such a rotten mood, he’d be playing along. He doesn’t, and she shrugs it off. She staples her fingers together and leans in, expression sliding into something conspiring. “Okay, so, what I’m about to do isn’t exactly legal.” 

He raises his eyebrows at her and pointedly looks around their surroundings. 

“It’s fiiiine,” she says with a dismissive wave of one hand. “The cameras are turned off.” 

His eyebrows go higher. She barks a laugh. 

“We’re not gonna kill you! Don’t worry, kid! I just wanted to talk to you about  _ options.  _ You don’t seem like you have a whole lot of them, right now. I just want to help! Off the books, so to speak.” 

“Uh huh,” he says. “Wow, entrapment is so subtle, how does anyone ever see through this.” 

_ “Teenagers,”  _ she says along with a roll of her eyes. “Listen, I’m not here as a cop right now, okay? I’m here as a crooked cop, which is  _ so _ different. Well, crooked is exaggerating it. Makes it sound like I’m working for criminals. I’m not! I’m working for the  _ army. _ That’s basically like the government, right? I think so.” 

“Mhmm.” 

“They’re sliding me and a few other guys a little extra dough under the table if we help them with recruitment, y’know? Like, say, we pull in a rowdy drunk or a junkie or whatever, they can’t pay bail or fines, and suddenly we’ve got no choice but to put nonviolent offenders in jail, which is terrible! I don’t care about the guys who’re ruining their own lives! I got into this to catch the bad guys, not the addicts and the hookers. Who cares about them? I feel bad for them! I wanna leave ‘em alone! But I can’t, since it’s _ my job.  _ So, the army helps me give them a compromise, an option, a way out.” 

She smiles at him expectantly with tobacco stained teeth. After a moment, he reluctantly nods at her to continue. “The war is always needing new and more bodies. You and me, we could come to an agreement. Agree to sign on and I get a nice fat bonus and  _ you _ don’t gotta go to jail. Hell, you get a job! A roof over your head, steady meals! Talk about an upgrade, amirite?” 

“... I’m a minor,” he says, because it’s obvious. He’s got some serious baby face going on. “I’m sixte--” 

“Ah ah!” she says, hand shooting out, palm flat and vertical, shutting him up. “I don’t wanna hear it! Listen, it’s like this. The more recruits I get, the more pay I get. But only _ valid _ recruits count. The army’s the army, they don’t get to break the law! They can only accept people who say that they’re eighteen or older, you hear me?” 

Plausible deniability, she means. “I hear you.” 

“So, what’s your age?” 

“Eighteen or older.” 

“Great! Fantastic! So, do we have a deal?” 

She holds out her hand. He looks at it. 

“One more thing,” he says. “I’m a guy.” 

She looks at him over her glasses. “Oh? Congratulations.” She doesn’t sound like she cares, sardonic, but he weirdly likes the response. He feels himself start to warm up to her, even though she’s _ so _ transparent. Not even trying to hide her motives from him at all, really. 

“If I’m going to say yes to this and you’re going to get your nice fat bonus, then I’m going to need for _ everyone _ to acknowledge that.” 

She pops her gum. “Don’t worry, the military’s got a program for that.” 

“It  _ does?” _

“Hormones and surgery and everything. Helps pull people in looking for  _ options,  _ y’know?” 

He stares at her. “My file has to say I’m a guy. All the way back. I don’t want _ anyone _ thinking that I’m something else, even if they’re a douche.” 

She grins, wide and sharp. “Easily done, buddy! No one’s looking too close at any of the fodder’s paperwork nowadays if you know what I mean. I mean, there’s so _ many _ of them, who’s got the time, right?” She winks at him. 

“Right,” he agrees eagerly, and shakes her hand. 

 

He wants a strange name, unique and interesting and  _ his. _ She makes him pick a boring one to avoid scrutiny. He pouts at it. Well, at least it’s a guy’s name, finally. It doesn’t quite feel like _his,_ though. It serves for now, but it’s not him. Just eight years, though. That’s all he had to agree to. After that, so long as nothing comes along that’ll change his mind (and what possibly could), his life and his body and his choices are finally all his. Including his name. 

He hopes it’s gonna be a cool one. 


	49. work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She’s fast and she’s busy and she’s strong and forceful and intimidating, the best damned Freelancer on this ship. She can avoid anyone for as long as she wants. Anyone at all--
> 
> Except for the Director.

After a long moment of just standing there doing nothing, Carolina had walked forward and picked up Maine’s body. She’s strong, but he was large and unwieldy, his corpse uncooperative. She’d resorted to dragging him, his legs trailing in the mud. She’d cleared her mind, just thought. One step after the other. Go around that wall, that body. Breathe. Mind your stance. Radio for extraction, give a barebones report in a flat voice, her lips numb, mind detached. Just focus on the work, Carolina. This isn’t really happening  _ now. _ Do the work. 

She did the work, and she did it well. 

The Counselor keeps trying to get her to sit down and just do  _ nothing. _ To think. To talk. To feel. 

She ignores him and avoids him and does the work. 

It had been like this, after she found out about mom. If she thought about it for longer than two seconds, in any kind of depth, she’d be incapacitated immediately, useless for the rest of the day, distracted and miserable, her lungs and eyes rebellious, traitorous, betraying her and hurting her and humiliating her. It slowly faded away with time, though. After only five years she could finally _ think _ about it without being taken out by her own body. 

Maine was not mom and she’s lost teammates before. It’s not the same, it hurts for different reasons. Reasons she can’t think about, or else she’ll be useless. It’ll go away eventually if she just keeps ignoring it. She’ll move on without noticing it. Until then, she has to  _ stop  _ herself from thinking about it. She has to work. She can’t stand still or think or feel. 

York keeps looking at her. Not the slightly dopey, sweet way he usually does. Concerned. 

It gives her hives. She avoids him too. 

She’s fast and she’s busy and she’s strong and forceful and intimidating, the best damned Freelancer on this ship. She can avoid anyone for as long as she wants. Anyone at all-- 

Except for the Director. 

She hopes he sent for her to send her on an important mission. She usually hopes, buried and muffled and distant and shameful with how stupid and childish and unlikely it is, that it’s for more personal reasons. But right now, if she has a conversation anywhere near personal, is reminded that she’s a person at all, she’s going to  _ break _ something. 

It’s a good indication that the Director isn’t going to be breaking out of any patterns any time soon when he doesn’t even look up from his screens when she enters the room, as usual. He likes to talk to (at) people without looking at them at all. Not as in avoiding their eyes, uncertainly looking away, but as in just getting the information and orders out with his mouth while his eyes do something else, like reading a report or focusing on writing one or even just looking out of a window at the void and the stars, like the least interesting thing in the galaxy is another person’s face and he’s got better things to do. 

It’s been the norm for a while now. 

“Director,” she says, standing at attention, because she’s not entirely sure that he noticed her entering. 

“Agent,” he replies, typing something. 

She gives him a moment. He doesn’t take it, continues typing. The inaction itches at her, so she says, “You wanted me for something?” 

“Go to the medical wing,” he says. 

Another moment. 

“For what?” she says. “What will I do?” 

Because there has to be something for her to  _ do.  _ It occurs to her, like a bucket of cold water or realizing that you’re out of ammo in the middle of a gunfight (not that that ever happens to her), that he might be sending her there for enforced rest. The Director’s word is law on the Mother of Invention. She wouldn’t be able to say no. She can’t stop moving. Absolutely not. 

(He hadn’t told her to stop and rest when her achilles tendon snapped during track, when she passed out during a test, when she took every extracurical she could and started sleeping only six hours a night, and then five, and then--) 

(It would be less accurate to say that the Director trusts her to succeed and more so to say that he expects perfection of her or else she’ll be dismissed and disregarded entirely, fully, and then she’ll lose the last of her family forever with no going back. She can feel it in her bones.) 

(Does she want for him to tell her to rest, or not? It would be a nightmare, but it’d be everything she’d ever wanted from him.)

She’s not supposed to be feeling. She tenses one muscle after another instead of shifting or fidgeting, standing still. 

“Surgery,” he answers her finally. He sounds impatient with her; the right thing for her to have done would’ve clearly have been to just go to the medical wing immediately after he’d said so, but knowing him he’s forgotten to tell the staff there what she’s supposed to be doing as well.  _ Somebody  _ needs to be fully briefed before she goes in. 

“I’m healthy,” she says. More accurately: she’s functional, which is what’s important. 

“For the _ AI,” _ he says, swiping a touch more forcefully than necessary at something on his screen. “It’s being put back into you.” 

_ No.  _

“We would have done it sooner,” he says, “but Agent Florida’s brute force ejection damaged it some. It had to be repaired, and it’s ready now.” 

She opens her mouth--

(The Director’s word is law on the Mother of Invention.)

(She can’t stop moving.)

She closes it, turns around, and walks out of the room. 

Towards the medical wing. 


	50. hit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A full body twitch, so sudden that it makes someone in the room yelp and drop something.
> 
> The body doesn’t feel like it normally does. Not familiar, except yes it is, but not in the right way, what is--
> 
> “Don’t,” Carolina says, and then grits her teeth.

The world feels faster than it used to be. Or maybe Caboose is slower, gradually waking up from his long, deep sleep. Or maybe…

The world is back. The world came back! Caboose thrums with wild excitement and energy for a moment taking everything he can in. A grey ceiling. The faint breathing of other people in the room. That weird hospital smell. The second hand feeling of air in lungs, blood in veins, of skin and bone and muscles and existing. It’s all something, and he basks in it.

And then he gets kind of bored. There’s still nothing to look at but the grey ceiling in between long slow blinks.

 _ <Agent Maine,> _ he says. _ <Wake up!> _

A full body twitch, so sudden that it makes someone in the room yelp and drop something.

The body doesn’t feel like it normally does. Not familiar, except yes it is, but not in the right way, what is--

“Don’t,” Carolina says, and then grits her teeth.

Caboose stills, which means that nothing in him moves, but he is nothing but thoughts and sometimes lights, which means that his thoughts stop.

“Does everything feel like it should?” someone asks.

Carolina nods tightly, and sits up. A dizzy sensation washes over her and takes Caboose along with it, like a big wave at the beach or a tilt-a-whirl at an

  


amusement park. There’s no bright colors or clowns or popcorn _anywhere._ There’s no cotton candy here. The planet looks weird and sad, all grey and barren and quiet, empty houses and empty streets wherever they go. This field trip isn’t as fun as Caboose had thought it’d be.

“Ah, Agent Maine,” he says. “I think we are lost.”

Maine shakes his head.

In the distance, gunfire.

  


She almost falls off the chair, and steadies herself at the last second against the armrest. “I’m fine,” she says tensely, shaking off someone who moves to steady her. She shakes her head as if to clear away cobwebs or a bad dream.

 _ <Where is Agent Maine?> _ he asks. He was _just_ here. Caboose is supposed to be in Maine, not Carolina, that was the decision, she gave him to him, she can’t take it back now, that’s not fair. Maine wouldn’t give him up like that. He said that they were good partners. He _said._

Carolina clutches at her head like she has a bad headache, fingers digging in harshly into her scalp.

“Are you experiencing any pain?” someone asks.

 _“No,”_ she says. “Shut--” She cuts herself off, biting her tongue and the rest of the sentence off.

_ <Where is he? Where is he, where is he, where is he, where is he where is he where is he where is he where is he where is where is-->   _

An image of Maine lying in mud floats up to the surface of Carolina’s mind like a bloated corpse in a river. That’s not a good place to fall asleep, to fall down, to faint. He will have to wash his armor.

She punches the armrest, hard enough to make the closest cautiously approaching person flinch away. _“How could you possibly not know!?”_ she demands, raw and too loud and too sharp.

Some of the people exchange cautious glances.

“The AI was damaged, it had to be repaired,” one says.

“There may be some loss of memory, regarding its last few days implanted in Agent Maine,” one says.  

“Deleted data,” one says.

“It had to be done,” one says.

“Unavoidable,” another one says.

Maine is in the mud. Maine

  


is moving _so fast._ He picks up one monster and throws it at another one. He buries his knifle in the chest of another. Knocks one’s snout off like it’s wet paper tissues, blood and gristle flying and spraying.

It’s raining. Caboose focuses on that, letting Maine work with Caboose’s strength and his own reflexes. The rain is the heavy kind that sounds so nice and sleepy on top of a roof.

Maine crushes a monster’s skull.

Not that he’s ever heard it on a roof before.

Maine is surrounded, and winning.

He lives in space, where it’s always night and clear starry skies.

A monster swipes at Maine with one huge claw, moving to disembowel him.

He’s heard it on top of a tent before, though.

Maine moves to dodge--

When? With who? It was

  


“--lina? You look very pale. Your disorientation is strange considering that you’ve undergone this procedure before. Perhaps you should say for observation--”

Carolina is on her feet, lurching her way towards the door, roughly shoving and shouldering her way past anyone who gets in her way.

“I’m fine,” she says, a phrase that comes without thought whenever she’s in pain and isn’t supposed to respond by taking the other person down. “I’m fine, I’m fine.”

“Agent Carolina--” The door closes behind her, cutting off the voice. She starts taking deep breaths, sucking air into her lungs. She feels sweaty.

“You,” she says, voice haggard. “What was that. What-- you can’t remember. You’re not supposed to remember--”

 _ <Remember what?> _ he asks. She’s talking to him, but she’s upset and he’s not supposed to be with her, he’s supposed to be with Maine, his best friend. He’s in the mud. He has to go and find him and help him up. He has to--

Carolina makes a pained noise, jaw clenched, like she’s wounded. “We can’t just go and bring him back,” she snaps. “He’s _gone.”_

 _ <Then let’s find him,> _he says, even though Carolina never ever ever does anything he says or wants.

The phantom sensation of dragging something heavy and cold washes over Carolina like a bucket of ice cold water, stealing her breath. Hot spiky go-away-don’t-touch-me anger sparks and flames inside of her like a flash fire, fast and sudden.

 _“He’s dead!”_ she shouts, scream ringing in the metal hallway.

Caboose stops.

Carolina stops.

She raises a hand to her mouth, clamps down on it hard enough to bruise.

 _It doesn’t hurt if you don’t let it hit you,_ a past Carolina says in her silent mind.

They’ve both been hit.

  


Caboose comes out of the strange vivid fantasy of lying inside of a tent that’s warm with several people’s body heat and hot breath, other people pressed up against him on both sides, dozing with the soft comforting noise of rain on the tent and someone’s soft snores, feeling utterly safe and calm.

Maine looks down. He’s dropped his weapon. There are claws buried knuckle deep into his stomach. 

He’s been hit.


	51. her own medicine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Before the surgery, she’d grimly, unforgivingly, and mercilessly made a promise to herself to not ignore Caboose this time. To find a different, better way. She always keeps her promises to herself, her harsh rules and strict routines and ambitious goals.
> 
> Less than ten minutes in with him, and she's back on her bullshit.

Carolina immediately goes to the gym and doesn’t leave for eight hours, not stopping for a single break. Caboose pulses with distress as distracting as a klaxon for the first seven hours, panickedly taking in and alternately flinching away from what he’d remembered. She stubbornly acts like that doesn’t even exist. She’s the most stubborn woman in the universe, so this works well for her. 

By the eighth hour, he’s quiet. She chugs two bottles of water in a row, soaked in sweat. Her hands are trembling from exhaustion. Nothing else. 

She pants in the quiet of the room. 

Before the surgery, she’d grimly, unforgivingly, and mercilessly made a promise to herself to not ignore Caboose this time. To find a different, better way. She always keeps her promises to herself, her harsh rules and strict routines and ambitious goals. 

Less than ten minutes in with him, and she's back on her bullshit. The plastic water bottle crumples in her fist and she throws it at the wall like a petulant child, like _South._ Takes a deep breath. She will never let herself break her own promises, no matter how difficult it gets. She forces herself to think about it, for the first time. 

Maine had made the decision to leave on his own, charging in all alone into a warzone. She hadn’t ordered him to do that, or encouraged it in him. But could she have stopped it? She hadn’t known that she needed to. But could she have known, if she’d paid more attention? Spent more time with him? Instead of skittishly avoiding him just because she couldn’t look at him or the blue light hovering over his shoulder without thinking about her own failures, which has always been the worst most hated things in the world to her. 

Her stomach sinks and curdles, like there’s something rotting inside of it. She’s never going to be able to know for sure if she could have stopped it, because she hadn’t been trying her best from the start. She should always be trying her best. She shouldn’t be hiding away from things just because they make her  _ feel bad. _ She was his leader. She should have been looking out for him. She deserves this doubt, this regret, but she _ hates it.  _

And Caboose… 

It had been his fault. He’d been  _ inside Maine’s head _ and he hadn’t tried to stop him from leaving from what she’d seen in the short flashes, hadn’t been trying hard enough at the very least. And he’d distracted him. Maine had been doing fine. He was one of the best. That was why he was on the board. But Caboose hadn’t been focused on the fight because he was a squeamish distractible coward, like a child choosing to chase a butterfly instead of helping his brother gut a fish. He’d been lost in his head, and he’d taken Maine along with him once one of those--memory things--grabbed at him. Something about tents, rain. And Maine had died. Because of Caboose. 

Because of Maine’s reckless impatience. 

Because of Carolina’s cowardly shamed avoidance. 

He’s at least as much at fault as Carolina is. 

She’s always held people to strict standards, and herself the strictest because she should be better, the best. She  _ knows _ that every mistake she makes is avoidable, the product of laziness or distraction or hesitation or stupidity. It  _ is _ possible to be perfect, if you only just never stop trying your hardest. Carolina _ is  _ trying, she swears, she swears. Except she keeps looking back and seeing ways she could have been better, superior choices clear and obvious now that should have been just as clear and obvious then. She tries so hard, and yet she still keeps  _ fucking up.  _

It’s… intolerable. Except anything is tolerable, of course, if you just try hard enough. 

She’s always held herself to the strictest standards, and it feels strange and wrong to try and  _ share _ the blame with Caboose. As if it should either objectively not be her fault at all, or all of it should be on her. If it was partially her fault, then it was all her fault, because she’s faster and stronger and smarter and better than everyone else, she should be held to higher standards, she should be responsible. Carolina messing up is worse than someone else messing up, because  _ what excuse does she have?  _ She’s the  _ best.  _

It feels so strange, comparing herself to  _ Caboose. _ As if they’re the same. Same worth, same ability to make mistakes. The thought is alien. 

She realizes, suddenly, that Caboose is radiating hurt like she’s rubbing salt in his open bleeding wounds. 

She wonders how much of that he’d just heard, how much of it he’d understood or only gotten the gist of, the underlying emotions. She’s not entirely sure how much the AIs can get from their hosts. Something about concepts, feelings, associations. 

It doesn’t matter. None of what she’d just thought was something she’d ever say to a grieving or hurt or traumatized teammate. You’re not supposed to talk to allies the way you talk to yourself. You’re supposed to be harsh and unforgiving to yourself, and encouraging and constructive with your teammates. Carolina tries to be. (Her standards are strict.) 

“Caboose,” she says, and the name comes out in a way it never has from her before. Not annoyed or exasperated or impatient or furious. Tired, mostly. She feels drained numb, in a way that’s almost like training until her head goes empty, but not quite. Training until her head is nice and quiet makes her feel like she could climb a thousand mountains without breaks with patient determination, no outwards signs of her exhaustion. She feels  _ done, _ now. Done with herself, the situation, always, always fucking up no matter how hard she tries. 

She reaches blindly for something, anything to say. She’s tried, awkwardly, a bit ineptly, to be gentle with rattled teammates before. Never with Caboose. Reaching for the right words feels more impossible than ever. 

But Carolina is excellent at never letting herself fool herself into thinking that she doesn’t have to do something, that it can wait or that someone else can do it, and she’s even better at forcing herself to do things while she’s exhausted to the bone. 

And she’s the leader. She needs to take care of her team. That’s her job. Start doing it already, soldier. 

“I’m sorry,” she settles on, simply because it seems like the most obvious, fitting thing to say, even though she feels like a clumsy oaf as she says it. What is she apologizing for? Which specific part? All of it? You can’t apologize for mistakes, Carolina. Those aren’t forgivable. Just get up and don’t do it again. Actions, not words. If you ask people to forgive you and they do, that’s just going to give you permission to do it all over again. 

She has to say  _ something,  _ though, and that’s all she can come up with. 

Caboose doesn’t say anything. His feelings change slowly, like sunlight through a window, the change hard to notice and impossible to grasp, to touch. 

“I should have been. Better with you,” she says. The words are painful to say. Like she’s calling attention to her mistakes, instead of quietly letting them fade away like the shameful things they are by never acknowledging them openly and twisting herself up on the inside over them so that she never does it again, so she can shine with so many new accomplishments that she can just let those few, tiny, rare mistakes get washed out and forgotten, finally, finally irrelevant compared to the rest of her. 

(The Director never forgets a single mistake.) 

Carolina is good at working through pain. She’s good at improving. She has to improve. One of her men died over it. Face anything, no matter how awful. 

“You deserved better than me,” she says, voice going creaky. There shouldn’t be anyone better than her. 

But there was, wasn’t there. He and Maine were excellent together, apparently. 

They’re all getting along with their AIs so much better than her. 

The problem is her. 

Her breath is shallow and her eyes sting and this hurts, this  _ sucks. _

She just breathes for some long minutes. Gets a hold of herself, even though she still feels so horribly weak and fragile. 

“Caboose?” she asks. 

She probes at that faint presence of other at the back of her head. Tries to get a read of him. He feels differently now, not hysterical or afraid. He feels… resentful. Hurt. Petty. Sulky. 

Caboose still doesn’t say anything. 

He’s ignoring her, she realizes. A taste of her own medicine. 

She puts a hand up to her mouth and a noise that’s half laugh and half something else escapes her, eyes wet. Yeah, she’s definitely earned this. 


	52. She and him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> South is gearing up to either give in with an eye roll or swear at him, but then she gets shot.
> 
> She falls like a crashing plane.

The mission, in Donut’s humble and realistic opinion, is going great! They’re supposed to completely demolish this enemy base, and it’s going surprisingly easily. It’s all isolated, so they just had to blow up some important parts of the ships that they could use to leave while North took out the communications equipment that they could use to call for help at the same time. Now it’s just a matter of picking them all off. 

Some might think that avoiding being shot by about thirty people with guns would be achingly hard, but South is flying, and not even in straight lines. There’s nothing straight about her! 

She puts her hands behind her, roars,  _ “BOOM!” _ and Donut sends them flying, heat erupting behind them, temporarily shutting off her suits ability to hear so that he doesn’t blast her eardrums to pieces. Bullets fly into the sky, trying to hit them, and she angles one hand in another direction, says the word again, and then she’s suddenly tearing through the air in an entirely different direction. 

She’s more focused on evasion right now, but they keep hurting or outright killing one or two soldiers with every explosion, happy collateral. Somewhere in the distance, a sniper keeps dropping soldiers. 

Donut’s enjoying the happy adrenaline from South when North’s voice comes over the comms. 

_ “South, your tracker,” _ he says. 

“Ugh,” she says. “I’ve kinda got my hands full right now, North.” 

With fire, yes. 

_ “Just turn it on, please?”  _

“What, do you think you somehow wouldn’t be able to find me without it? Did you go blind and deaf while I wasn’t paying attention?” 

_ “South,” _ North says in his most mom-like tone yet. Donut is itching to try and play peacemaker, but his interference might just make the whole interaction more… explosive. 

South is gearing up to either give in with an eye roll or swear at him, but then she gets shot. 

She falls like a crashing plane. 

 

He opens his eyes. It takes a few tries, because his eyelids feel sticky with something, like someone spilled syrup on his face. She stares blankly out in front of her. She can see, but the image isn’t snapping together and making sense in her brain, like one of those paintings that are all dots and you’re supposed to unfocus your eyes to see the lady with the vase or whatever. 

He twitches, tries to move, groans. That hurt. 

She tries to move. Her muscles cramp like she’s trying to move in two different directions at once. 

His body isn’t cooperating. 

She can’t move. 

Something is wrong. 

In the distance, the noise of men shouting. He doesn’t know if it’s because of the way his ears are ringing or the distance, but the words themselves don’t really register or make sense. Her thoughts are scattered, and she feels like she can’t gather them up again and make them make sense. His head pounds painfully. 

She is overwhelmed by the sudden conviction that the shouting men are looking for her, and it isn’t going to be good when they find her. Like waking up to being attacked and fighting back before you can even remember your own name. A lightning bolt of inexplicable understanding. 

He has to stay right where he is, hiding and silent. 

She has to _ move,  _ get up and get out of here. 

The body twitches and spasms, a high keening sound escaping the mouth. 

The eyes close, and darkness takes over. 

 

_ “South,”  _ an agonized voice crackles into his ear. He realizes that he is awake. He realizes that he was asleep.  _ “Can you hear me? Are you alive?”  _

This voice doesn’t register as dangerous, like the shouting men. 

_ “Donut, are you on? Is South okay?”  _

There are footsteps, crunching through the undergrowth only feet away. She blinks her eyes. She’s lying down amongst plants, large and green, the soil brown and wild. There’s an unfamiliar but large bug crawling across her arm that’s sprawled out in front of her. 

He thinks about moving, and then wonders who the footsteps belong to. The safe voice, or one of the shouting men? 

Those aren’t her brother’s footsteps. That’s now how he walks. She knows. 

He needs to be quiet until the man leaves. 

She needs to kill him before he kills her. 

Every muscle is rigid, tense and shaking and unmoving. 

One hand twitches jerkily in the direction of the footsteps. 

_ Boom,  _ she mouths. 

He’s supposed to make explosions happen when she says that, he remembers. 

Blinding light and overwhelming sound, the world ripped out from underneath them. Flying, no gravity-- 

She smacks helmet first into the ground, or a tree, or a cliff, something sturdy and hard enough to make the helmet make a terrifying cracking noise, and her pounding head stops feeling like anything at all. The thoughts she’d been slowly regathering fall back out of her hands and roll far, far away. 

_ “South! I saw that, everyone saw that, I’m heading over in your direction ASAP, be careful--”  _

The eyes close. 

 

Gunfire. Very close by. They open their eyes. 

North shoots someone in the head, gets clipped in the shoulder by a bullet, deflects another one with his shield, closes the distance and starts exchanging blows with one soldier and then uses them as a meat shield against the bullets fired by another soldier a short distance away. They shout in horror and stop shooting. 

She and him and South and Donut stand up. No one seems to even notice. 

Rude. 

They take the time to aim their shot, palms flat out. An explosion comes tearing out. They protect their sight and hearing this time. No helmet, so they just shut it off directly, in the flesh. The absolute darkness and absolute silence flicker away to reveal success and smoke. 

Three people are dead, and all eyes are on them now. North makes a sound of pure relief and exhaustion. They look up. The sun had been high in the sky when the mission had started, but now it’s dark and starry. He must have been fighting and looking for them for hours. 

Angry protectiveness flares through them, mixing with fond gratitude. They smile, friendly and toothy. “You guys should surrender.” 

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys come and check out this awesome [podfic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14568399) of QOQ! Ahh, I love it so much.


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